from the Emergency Response Units. A half-dozen squad cars, an ambulance and several vans now clogged the road by the gates. Minogue watched the Superintendent slide out of his seat and listen while a Sergeant briefed him. Minogue was sitting in the passenger seat of a squad car, the Howards in the back. Crossan, the last to be interviewed, was in a nearby squad car. Minogue had noticed that the ERU Guards didn’t mix much with the uniformed Guards. The former had at least covered their guns after inspecting the house. Minogue looked down at the Elastoplast on the back of his hand. The air in the car was too hot now and he turned down the blower.
He spoke over his shoulder to the Howards.
“Are ye warm enough in the back?”
Sheila Howard was leaning into her husband and he had his arm around her shoulders. Dan Howard touched his forehead where a small, fine piece of glass had been expertly removed by an ambulance attendant.
“We are,” said Howard in a whisper.
The interior light of the Toyota accentuated Howard’s pallor. His curls were greyed lighter in parts by dust from the pulverised plaster. Minogue turned around. His elbows rubbed at the cloth of his jacket and reminded him that he had rubbed raw spots there from his movement across the floor during the fusillade. Sheila Howard’s eyes were small and fixed on the headrest in front of her.
“Are they here yet?” Howard asked.
The bomb squad, he means, Minogue realised. He edged closer to the windscreen to be rid of the glare from inside the car and squinted at the house. His Fiat and the Audi seemed like sleeping, animate threats. He still couldn’t believe that his own geriatric, baby-blue Fiat-a mobile part of his and Kathleen’s home, full of receipts five years old, tinfoil from chocolate bars (Kathleen still liked Whole Nut, he recalled lazily), hairpins, screws and nuts, faded maps and ancient paper handkerchiefs used and unused-all this, and now his car might harbour sudden death. He shivered in spite of the heat.
“I don’t think so,” he said to Howard.
The driver’s door opened and Russell, strangely chaste in civvies, got in.
“Evening, Dan, missus,” said the Superintendent before he slammed the door against the damp air. “Don’t be worrying now. I’m not about to drive off.”
The Howards didn’t seem to notice the humour.
“And the man himself,” said Russell, nodding to Minogue. “Alo Crossan’s the fourth one?”
“Yes,” said Minogue.
“Let’s see Alo stand up in court and defend these gangsters now, after we catch them,” Russell said. “See if tonight’s work has given Alo a bit of insight into his clientele.” He turned away from Minogue as best he could under the wheel and addressed the Howards.
“Sure ye wouldn’t like to stop in at the ’ospital, just in case?”
Howard shook his head. Minogue watched Russell’s eyes make a study of the Howards for competence, shock.
“We’re going to wait for a bit of daylight to have a look at the cars,” Russell went on. “We can get new sensors down from Dublin that might save us putting a few dents in the vehicles. Have ye a place to go tonight?”
“Well,” Howard mumbled, and glanced at his wife.
“We’ll have Guards with ye night and day, that goes without saying,” said Russell.
“All right,” said Howard. “I mean, thanks.”
“We found casings-spent ammunition, that is to say-out in the driveway,” Russell said mildly. “It looks as if someone fired a submachine gun.”
Again Russell looked the Howards over as if to assess their suitability for a task. Howard merely nodded.
“Have ye had any, ah, inkling, that this might happen?”
“No,” answered Howard. “I didn’t think I’d be considered a…” He looked down at his wife. Target, Minogue finished the sentence within.
“Can I have a word with you outside a minute?” he asked Russell.
Russell seemed to consider granting a favour, then stepped out before the Inspector. He met Minogue at the front of the Toyota and took a peppermint from his pocket. He dropped it onto his tongue, eyeing Minogue all the while.
“They’re a bit out of it,” said Minogue.
“And you’re not?”
“Less so, I’m thinking. I tend to get the jitters later on.”
“You’ve been under fire before, so,” said Russell with heartless levity. “Dublin’s full of excitement, they say.”
Minogue put on a tight, insincere smile.
“Dull enough, compared to here.”
Russell manoeuvred the peppermint to his back teeth and bit it decisively.
“What were you up to with the Howards tonight? Aside from ducking bullets, like.”
“Exchanging pleasantries and noting interior decorating tips to relay them to my wife.”
“Huh. You and Alo Crossan. The Liberator.”
Minogue reflected for a moment on Russell’s cynical nickname for the lawyer. The Liberator, Daniel O’Connell, champion of Catholic Emancipation a hundred and fifty years ago, had seen his monster rallies eclipsed by the tactics of gelignite and guns. The Superintendent’s small eyes bored into him while the jaws worked at crushing the last pieces of lozenge.
“Crossan has given himself the mission in life of setting defendants free on the streets, gangsters that should be kept under lock and key. Ad infinitum,” Russell said, grinding his teeth in final farewell to the peppermint.
“That’s Latin,” he added. He kept his blank stare locked onto Minogue’s eyes.
“Who?” said Minogue, adverting to grammar. Russell ignored or misread Minogue’s pedantry. He thumbed another lozenge into his mouth.
“Maybe even the likes of the boyos that did the work tonight,” Russell said. “Wouldn’t that look good on his gravestone: ‘Shot by his clients’?” Minogue looked away from the Superintendent to the arrival of a Hiace van.
“I think that Mr Crossan plans to be around and working for quite a while,” he murmured.
“Lie down with a dog…”
Russell let the proverb find its own way home in Minogue’s mind.
“Have you people in mind for this shooting?” Minogue asked.
“Course we have. We’ll be knocking on doors all over the county tonight. Will that put a dent in your holidays?”
Minogue considered the Howards’ plight again. Howard did double-duty as a prosperous member of the new Ireland, a man of land and commerce as well as a parliamentary figure. He was an ideal target. Would the Howards ever feel safe in their house again?
“It’ll put dents in a lot of holidays.”
“You may well be right,” Russell allowed. His crinkly hair, backlit by the headlights, glistened with a covering of fine rain.
“There could be jobs and factories lost on the head of this. Speaking of heads, now. Preliminary investigations”-he paused to sniff the air and survey the scene before him-“preliminary investigations tend to suggest that the job done there tonight on this fine house was fairly, can I say, ‘fine-tuned.’ The shooters went high. ”They needn’t have ducked, Sergeant Hanrahan inside tells me.”
Minogue resisted the inclination to retaliate. He watched Russell lob another peppermint into his mouth.
“Rank amateurs tend to down high-flying birds when they pull triggers,” the Inspector said.
“Are you suggesting that this was attempted murder, so?”
“You decide that. After all, I’m on me holidays.”
“You’re hardly the kind of tourist that these gangsters had in mind of frightening now, I’d say,” said Russell. “And by the way: you can have the tourism thing and still keep people on the land, to my way of thinking. People’s livelihoods depend on the tourists, even tourists down from Dublin.”
“You don’t say, now. I was born and reared on a small farm. I’ve a brother who wouldn’t be in the farming today if he hadn’t been able to pick up a few fields over the years. There are families who can’t bid down a man
