EIGHT
Here, get up. It’s nearly ten o’clock.” His eyelashes had stuck together. He panicked for a moment and began rubbing hard at them. He had been crying last night, he remembered. Was it a dream, or had he heard someone moving around in the night? He looked up into the lamp shade overhead. He remembered yesterday and stale fear broke through his bewilderment. Jammy Tierney was still standing in the doorway.
“Thanks, Jammy. Great. I’m okay now, man. Yeah.”
Tierney stared at him. What the hell was up with him?
“I’m going out,” said Tierney. “You can’t stay. You might rob the light bulbs or something.”
Very smart, Jammy. He rolled to the side of the sofa and sat up.
“You look a right knacker and you sleeping in your clothes.”
“Jammy?” He cleared his throat. “Could you loan me a bit of something? You know…?”
“What? What bit of something?”
“A tenner, maybe?”
Tierney folded his arms.
“Fiver? I’ll pay you back. All I need is…” He stopped then. Jammy had that weird grin.
“A fiver,” said Tierney. “Only a fiver? You fall in the door here at eleven o’clock last night, looking like you been through a lawn mower. No explanation, don’t want to tell me what has you wrecked. I hear you poking around here last night when you’re supposed to be sleeping. In the fridge. Opening drawers. Snooping. Now you want to sponge money off me?”
“Wait, Jammy, that’s not the way it is, man-”
“You must be joking. Go home and tidy yourself up. Get a job.”
“Hold on there a minute, Jam-”
“And then go to a clinic and start telling the truth! For once in your life, Leonardo.”
The urge to scream in Jammy Tierney’s face welled up in him. Mr. Fit, with his motorbike and his nixers and his pool sharking. They’d been friends all these years but all he’d done this last while was preach to him about drugs.
“Jammy, I swear to God, man! I don’t do drugs. I don’t! Not the way you think. I mean, man, I wish I could be like you, you know. Really! But a joint never hurt anyone. Takes the sting off things, you know? Christ, you know what it’s like out there! But I’m tired of that scene. Really I am.”
Tierney gave him a bleak look.
“Jases, Leonardo. Always that hurt kid look. I don’t believe I’m doing this.”
“I’ve only got you, man. I’m sorry. I’m going to turn things around, I swear.”
“What happened to you last night then? You weren’t pissed.”
“I ran into a spot of bother at home, like. You know? The ma’s giving me stick and all. I just couldn’t handle it last night. I had to get out.”
“You had to get out, did you.”
This bastard, he thought. Leaning against the doorjamb, putting him through this. So bloody smug, so much better than he was. He thought he was doing him a favour lecturing him. He met Tierney’s eyes for a moment. He imagined giving him a kung-fu leaping kick right in the snot: boom!
“Promise me what I give isn’t going into some dealer’s pocket.”
“Honest to God, Jammy. I’ve had it, man. I know I need to change.”
“How much?”
“Get a job, the whole thing-”
“How much money?”
“Oh.” He tried to laugh but couldn’t.
“A hundred?”
He followed Tierney through the doorway into the kitchenette. Christ, even this place was spotless. Maybe Jammy did it to to impress his mot. Her stuff there in the bathroom.
“Fifty, Jammy. Fifty?”
“What for?”
“Bus fares. Some to the ma. A shirt maybe. To do interviews?”
Tierney picked up his helmet.
“I don’t have it.”
“Twenty then-”
“Shut up. I have to go into town anyway. Come on.”
He’d been leading him on. He looked around the room. Bloody snob, that’s what he was. Always talking of making something of yourself, moving up. It was a bit like Mary, but with her, you knew that she could do it. Jammy Tierney wouldn’t. He’d just have the attitude, looking down his nose at the people he’d grown up with. But he’d never be any better than them.
He rubbed sleep from his eyes.
“I’ll get you something,” Tierney murmured.
“Jesus, Jammy!”
He clapped Tierney’s shoulder.
“Great, man! I knew you wouldn’t sell me out!”
Tierney glared at him. He was about to say something but he let it go. Weirder and weirder, he thought. Too much health did that to you. Too wound-up, too perfect.
“The back of Charley’s, the poolhall, do you know it? Around twelve.”
“That’s great, Jammy. Brilliant, man!”
Minogue put down the phone. He studied the doodles he had drawn while he’d been talking with Toni Heffernan. Triangles; was that anger? He crossed out the i and put in a y. Was it short for Antoinette? Short was right: she had been curt, blunt and short with him. Sister Joe was out on a call. When would she be back? Toni Heffernan didn’t know. Minogue had said he would try again-unless she were to phone him first. He made his way to the kitchen, half-filled the kettle and plugged it in. He was searching for a clean cup when Kilmartin arrived. The Chief Inspector began working on his ear with his baby finger. Minogue opened the bag of coffee beans and inhaled the aroma.
“Any luck,” said Kilmartin.
“I’m trying to get ahold of a Sister Joe. She runs a drop-in centre for kids on the street. She might know Mary.”
“Uhhh.”
Minogue poured beans into the grinder and resealed the bag. He let the grinder run longer than he needed. Kilmartin was still there when he turned back.
“Yourself?”
“Ah, Christ, don’t be talking. Politicking. Phoned Serious Crimes, talked to Keane. ‘We’d appreciate your input’ and all that, says I. Nice to him and all, I was. Still he hems and haws. Huh. Felt like giving him the, well, the you- know-what.”
“In the you-know-where?”
“Exactly. I might have to beat some sense into that mob of his soon.”
Kilmartin rubbed more vigorously at his nose. He stared at the kettle.
“Jack Mullen,” he said, and looked up at Minogue. “He’s hopping the ball, isn’t he?”
Minogue frowned.
“He’s a nutter, Matt, isn’t he?”
“He has a temper, James. That interests me a lot, so it does.”
Kilmartin nodded.
“What’s the name of his outfit again?”
“The self-help group, you mean? The Victory Club.”
Minogue watched Kilmartin lighting a cigarette.
“Victory over the drink, like. Well, I’m sure that’s not a bad thing in itself. Like Al Anon. But as for this sitting
