“Hurry up,” he said to Toner.
Twenty minutes took them to an industrial estate north-west of the city. As the sky darkened, Fegan instructed Toner to park up between the low buildings, out of sight of the rumbling motorway. He had been here before, nine years ago, when the two UFF boys died badly. Now those same UFF boys paced in the drizzle, hate and pain on their faces, touching themselves in the places where Fegan had opened them. He couldn’t return their stares.
The estate lay derelict now, just rows of concrete and steel skeletons on waste ground, waiting to be demolished and replaced by a housing development. They looked like giant mourners at a graveside.
“Give me the keys,” Fegan said.
Toner passed them back, his eyes flitting towards Fegan and away again. “What do you want, Gerry? You’re scaring the shite out of me.”
Fegan slipped the keys into his pocket. “Who’s the cop?”
Toner blinked. “What cop?”
“The one you have inside. You told me about him the day I got lifted. The one who beat the shit out of me.”
Toner held his hands up. “I don’t know, Gerry. Just some peeler. I’ve never met him.”
“You’re lying. Davy Campbell told me he was your contact.”
“No, that’s not true. I swear to God, Gerry, I don’t know who he is.”
“Give me your hand.”
Toner slowly shook his head. “No.”
Fegan raised the pistol with his right hand, steady now, and extended his left.
“No,” Toner said.
Fegan pressed the Walther against Toner’s temple. The solicitor screwed his eyes shut and held out his left hand.
“I’ll ask you one more time,” Fegan said as he gripped Toner’s little finger. “Who’s the cop?”
“Aw, Christ, Gerry. Please, I don’t know anything. I just run errands for McGinty when he needs me. I take his cases for him, that’s all. I don’t go near any of that other stuff.”
Fegan placed the Walther on the seat beside him, well out of Toner’s reach, and took the lawyer’s wrist in his right hand. With his left, he twisted the finger back and up, first feeling the stiff elasticity of the joint, next the jolt of it giving way, then the looseness of the broken bone.
Toner screamed.
“You could’ve just told me, Patsy. That didn’t have to happen.”
“Ah, fuck!” Toner tried to pull his hand back, but Fegan squeezed and the solicitor screamed again.
Heat gathered around the break, the puffy swelling already filling Fegan’s hand. He felt it pulse through the thin membrane of the surgical gloves. “Who’s the cop?” he asked.
“Please, Gerry, oh God, please.” Tears rolled down Toner’s flushed cheeks. “I can’t tell you. McGinty. Oh Christ, he’ll kill me. Please, Gerry, don’t.”
Fegan gripped Toner’s ring finger. “Who’s the cop?”
“Gerry, please, I can’t.”
Toner screamed again, drowning out the sound of cracking bone.
Fegan sighed. He was surprised at Toner. He’d always taken him for weak; the solicitor was anything but. He ground the bones together.
“Who’s the cop?” he asked. Toner’s screams drowned out the question, so he asked again, louder. “Who’s the cop?”
“Stop! Jesus, stop!”
Fegan released the fingers and moved his grip to Toner’s wrist. The heat from the solicitor’s hand seemed to fill the car, along with the thick smell of sweat and fresh urine. Nausea came rolling in, but Fegan pushed it back.
“Who’s the cop?” he asked.
“Oh, Jesus . . . Jesus . . . Brian Anderson. He’s a sergeant. We’ve had him for years. Since the Eighties.”
“What does he do for you?”
Toner breathed deep through his nose, his face twisted in pain. “Not much these days. Tips us off sometimes, if there’s a raid coming. McGinty pays him a few quid every week just to have him on side.”
Fegan let his hand drift down so Toner’s palm rested against his. “Not much these days, you said. Before that, what’d he do?”
“Information,” Toner hissed. “Other cops. Their cars, where they lived, where they drank, where their kids went to school. He used to sell information to McGinty.”
Fegan remembered. He remembered the RUC man’s face when he saw the gun in Fegan’s hand.
“He got hurt when he was a month on the job,” Toner continued, panting between words. “A coffee-jar bomb when he was on patrol. Fucked up his hip. Crippled when he was twenty-three. He’s been riding a desk ever since. Admin, records, answering phones, that sort of stuff. He’s a bitter fucker. Started selling out his mates. I always handled the money. I paid him. Aw, Christ, Gerry. McGinty’s going to kill me.”
Toner’s whimpering and pleading went on, but Fegan couldn’t hear him. He had stopped listening and started remembering.
It was Fegan’s first kill. Less than a week after his twentieth birthday he stood in the snow watching children emerge from a primary school. There was no sign of the RUC man’s Ford Granada. McGinty said he always arrived five minutes early when he picked his son up on a Friday.
Fegan looked across the road. A boy stood apart from the others, looking up and down the street. Nine years old, McGinty said. He wouldn’t see it. He wouldn’t be out of school yet when his father arrived. That’s what McGinty had said. McGinty was wrong. The RUC man was late, and the boy would see everything.
A bitter wind tore along the street, pulling snow with it. Fegan’s nose tingled with the cocaine the lads had given him for courage. The buzzing in his head couldn’t keep the cold or the urge to run out of his feet. Some of the parents looked at him, their faces lined with concern. They didn’t recognise him. That’s what they’d tell the police later. He was just some man, another parent they hadn’t seen before. A little odd-looking, maybe, something about the way he wore his hat, or the strange lankness of his hair. Fegan had seen himself in the car’s rear-view mirror and the wig looked convincing enough. They had dropped him at the corner and were parked up a street away, waiting for the sound of gunfire.
Fegan stopped breathing as the kid’s eyes met his. The boy’s brow creased as he stared back. Fegan couldn’t look away. The kid’s jaw slackened, parting his lips to let misted breath escape on the breeze.
He knew.
The sound of a car dragged the boy’s gaze away. A Ford Granada slowing to a halt. The boy ran onto the road, screaming at his father, waving his arms at Fegan. The RUC man stood hard on his brake pedal, skidding on the snow. He stared at his son, confused. As Fegan approached, the gun already in his hand, the boy pointed at him.
The RUC man turned his head, slack-jawed, his face showing no understanding of his own death. That changed as Fegan raised the gun. He understood. His eyes saw his end and Fegan squeezed the trigger twice. The car lurched forward and stalled as the RUC man’s feet left the pedals.
Quiet. A few seconds before, there had been the noise of children streaming from the school, the honking of car horns, the calls of parents. Now there was only the rushing in Fegan’s ears.