the lads off the beat and put them in cars.”
“Well, you’re not alone in that opinion. You know the place well, I take it.”
“Too well. Make a guess if you like.”
“All your life?” Almost a smile.
“Oh, very sharp there. You’re a veteran.”
“It certainly feels like that this time of the day. Do you live local?”
He nodded toward Mount Street bridge.
“The flats in there by the Turk Dunphy’s pub.”
He gave the policemen across the canal a bleak survey.
“I was born and reared in City Quay. Do you know where that is?”
“I do.”
“Oh, do you now. What age do you think I am?”
“Late middle age?”
“Hah. ‘Late middle age.’ I never had that one pulled on me before. I’m seventy-six! The wife is seventy-five. Do you know how many times I’ve walked this canal?”
“A good number of times, I’d say.”
He pinned Minogue with a look that told him his measure had been conclusively taken.
“You’d be right. I calculate some days. Something to do in me head when I’m out for a walk. I like it, the mental arithmetic, like. Everybody’s talking about exercise and clean living and diet nowadays. All me arse. If you don’t have the oul head in order, sure you’re bound to fall apart. In one way or another, like. What the hell use is running around and eating bits of lettuce if you’re a thick?”
“I think you’ve hit the nail on the head there.”
“You’re telling me I have. Rashers and sausages every second day with me. A few pints of the Friday. Have a cigar the odd time. And look at me. Never better. But the wife! The wife’s gone a bit slow this last while so I’ve had to put on the brakes. The better part of seventy years, I’ve been by here. Now, put your thinking cap on. Do you like doing sums in your head?”
Minogue looked to the reflections of the trees on the water.
“My strong point was more the reading and writing, I think.”
“Huh. Say five times a week, say maybe 250 times a year. How much is that?”
“Probably several times around the world at the Equator.”
He rubbed his chin.
“God, I never thought of it like that. No. The trick is to multiply by a thousand. That’s easy done, did you know that? You add noughts. Then divide your answer by four. Anyone can do that. Loved sums in school. I like to keep the head working. Even sitting in front of the telly. But, sure, what good does it do you, I ask myself sometimes. You need the bit of exercise, don’t you? Me and Timmy. You need a dog with you around here.”
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“There’s the four-legged rats do be out here. And then there’s the rats with just the two legs. Know what I’m saying?”
Minogue nodded.
“The whole place is gone to hell in a wheelbarrow. But maybe you wouldn’t see that. Being brass and all. When’s the last time you were on the beat here in town?”
“Close on twenty years ago. A bit more, actually.”
“Huh. Well, it’s die dog here now or eat the hatchet. Dublin’s gone. ‘Dublin in the rare oul times,’ my eye. No comfort in it any more. Oh, I know the canal was always the place for courting, but you’ve no idea what goes on here now. It’s kind of like, I don’t know what. A zoo.”
“There’s a thought, now.”
“Oh, the things you see these days.”
“What sort of things now?”
“Well, if you have to ask, it’s too late with you, isn’t it? Who’s supposed to be policing this place anyway?”
Minogue made a guess.
“Harcourt Street station. Maybe Donnybrook at this end. There’s plainclothes too out of Harcourt Terrace. Vice and probably Drugs.”
The old man gave a breathy sigh and yanked on the leash. The dog sat down, its ears twitching.
“Well, double that-no, triple that-and it still wouldn’t be enough. The whores. The types what are on the prowl for it too. Drugs. I’ve seen men here selling themselves. Boys, I should say. I’ll tell you one thing. Yous are never around when ye’re wanted.”
“Do you see much of that then?”
“What does that mean? Do you think I do be coming around here spying on the types that does be here at night? ”
“I meant that you seem to me to be an observant man, Mister, er…”
“Byrne. Joey Byrne. You’re not telling me something I don’t know already there now, pal. The wife says I should ignore the half of what I see. That I’d be better off, like. I don’t go along with that but I can’t be arguing with her all the time, can I?”
“You’re telling me. I forgot to introduce myself, sorry. Matt Minogue.”
“Inspector?”
“I’d prefer Matt.”
Joey Byrne fell to watching the policemen by the van.
“Well, what’s up?”
“We found a body in the canal.”
Minogue watched the glaze fall away from Joey Byrne’s eyes.
“My God. Go on, are you serious?”
Minogue nodded.
“When?”
“Last night.”
Byrne blessed himself.
“My God in heaven.” His tone had lost the Dubliner’s protective irony.
“So that’s what yiz are up to over there? I should have known. I must be slipping. Well, what I’m saying is, it’s bound to happen.”
“Were you here at all yesterday?”
‘“Deed and I was. Me and the wife and his nibs here. Timmy. Around the eight o’clock mark. Was it on the news?”
“I’m not sure. It probably was. We’d be looking for any witnesses here, you know. Passers-by.”
“Over there? Well, I don’t remember us going up that far now. We sort of sat down here on the bench a while. The wife, you know. She had an operation last year. She’s not firing on all cylinders yet.”
“Did you see anything peculiar?”
“Well, everything’s peculiar, that’s the trouble. Do you think she was done in here too?”
“There’s the problem now, Mr. Byrne. If I knew that for sure…”
“But sure there’s traffic here all evening. After dark now, that’d be a different matter entirely.”
He pivoted and elbowed Minogue’s arm at the same time.
“If you take my meaning. But you wouldn’t go down here now, by God. No sir.”
“You didn’t notice anything different yesterday evening then? On your walk.”
“Oh, no! Years ago, you might worry about finding a few tinkers or winos or the like that’d be bothering you for the few shillings. But, sure, even the winos and what have you won’t come near the place. They were nothing to the people what come by here these days. God, no. Do you know what I came around to thinking?”
Minogue raised his eyebrows.
“We’re going backwards, that’s what. Like I was saying to you. Not revolution, not evolution even. It’s devolution.”
He stretched out his arm. Minogue followed the waving hand as it swept across the buildings.
