yet?”
“No. But he doesn’t seem to care if his goose is cooked.”
Kilmartin cleared his throat. He gathered the phlegm behind his front teeth.
“Maybe the Egans’ll send in some brigand of a solicitor when they find he’s been taken in. Send him my way, why don’t you.”
“Lollipop Lenehan?”
“No, the bloody solicitor. I’m in the humour of barracking someone. Move Lenehan somewhere if a solicitor shows. Do you need me here?”
“Thank you, no, Jimmy. I’ll only use you for a big threat later on.”
“Ho ho ho! You’re only jealous.”
“Still no word on this Leonardo yet, is there?”
Kilmartin cut short his chortling.
“Neither hide nor hair of the little bastard. He’ll be Case 2 now, wait’n’you see. Turn up in a ditch with his throat cut or something.”
Kilmartin stared at the floor as though committing something sage to memory.
“Oh, well, what the hell,” he said. “Y’all have a nice day now, y’hear?”
Minogue watched Kilmartin’s jaunty walk back down the hall. Then he looked through the oblong safety glass set into the door. Lenehan was talking to his hands it seemed, and didn’t notice the Inspector looking in. Malone did, and his eyes widened for a moment as he glanced at Minogue. The Inspector reciprocated. Malone nodded once. Minogue elbowed into the monitoring room.
“Listen to this now,” said the Guard on the tapes. The Inspector picked up the headphones and looked through the one-way mirror.
“Yeah, so you knew her that way then,” Malone was saying. Murtagh pushed his chair back on two legs and cast the odd furtive glance at the glass.
“Well, fuck, everybody knew her,” said Lenehan. “Isn’t that the whole idea, like? I mean to say, do you know any other reason why a woman’d want to peel off her clothes in front of a camera?”
“I don’t know,” said Malone.
“You don’t know? Modelling, man. Sure, everyone’s at it. Fucking Madonna’s gotten everyone in on the act this time. Everyone thinks they’re stars. Jases.”
“There’s more than the family album changing hands in this business though,” said Malone. “Isn’t there now, Lolly?”
“Like what?”
“Drugs?”
Lenehan looked up under his eyebrows at Malone.
“You ought to know, Tommy. Unless you were walking around blindfolded since your mother got kicked out of the Rotunda with you under her arm.”
“What do I know?”
“The only real fucking drug is money.”
“Who has pictures of Mary?”
“I don’t know. Tell me.”
“Come on, Lolly. Who?”
“Don’t know. I seen some of them, that was all. They looked like the real McCoy too. Hardly recognize her.”
“How do you mean?”
Lenehan shrugged.
“Seen one, you seen them all, man. Or didn’t you know?”
Minogue gritted his teeth. Malone was slipping. He was challenging Lenehan too directly after finding out that he was a veteran head-case, someone who knew something from the inside.
“You’re fucking lying,” said Malone.
He was staring at Lenehan now. Minogue unhooked the head-set and headed for the door. The Guard on the switches grabbed his arm as he passed. Minogue picked up the head-set again. Malone went on in the same mild tone. Lenehan was licking his lips.
“I can’t believe you’re such a gobshite, Lolly. Here you go, sitting here, looking down the hole, and all you can do is lie through your teeth. You’re such a liar, I can smell it off you.”
Lenehan’s voice came out as a whisper.
“Fuck you, Tommy. You’re nothing more than a thick shit rozzer.”
“Oh, yeah? What about you? You never could make it with real people. Couldn’t go in a ring without a knife.”
“I know all about your fucked-up mind from Terry. You’re the one’s screwed up. Mr. Morality. Take a fucking jump.”
Malone laughed. Minogue exchanged a look with the Guard.
“And you think you’re tough,” said Malone. “You think that because you’re a lying fuck that’s going away for eight to ten, for real years, that the Egans are going to have a marble statue put up to you? You stupid iijit. They’ll leave you buried in there, Lolly. You’ll get out and you’ll be, lemme see, thirty-six, thirty-seven. Christ, you might as well jack it in here and now. If you can do your time without going stupid or getting an ugly boyfriend, you’ll stagger out of the ’Joy just in time to get walked on by fellas who aren’t even teenagers right now. Smart move there, Lolly. I’ve got to hand it to you there, man. Here-I’ll do you a favour: I’ll smuggle you in a shank so’s you can top yourself.”
“God, the language,” Minogue murmured. But Lenehan still hadn’t called for a solicitor. Malone’s eyes travelled around the room, stopped for several moments on the glass and then went on to Murtagh.
“Let’s get this gobshite a solicitor, John. Start burying him now. He’s good for nothing.”
Lenehan’s eyes were slits now. Minogue watched, appalled. Malone was throwing a key to this murder investigation out the window. Maybe even the killer. Whatever Minogue himself thought, Kilmartin would hit the roof. Murtagh seemed to be playing along but kept looking to the glass.
“What’s the fuss over a few bleeding snapshots, for Jases’ sake?” Lenehan burst out. “You’d have no trouble finding them if yous were real cops!”
Malone leaped out of his chair.
“Yeah, well, let’s say I was a real cop then!” he shouted. Lenehan looked up at him and his mouth opened. “Where would I get them? Where would I start?”
“Well, I don’t know, do I,” said Lenehan.
“What do you know, you fucking waster? When did you meet her? Where was it?”
“I didn’t meet her, meet her! I seen her in a pub. Someone said something. I don’t know! Then I was looking through pictures somewhere and I seen her again.”
“Where?”
“Where what?”
“Where did you see her in person?”
“Some pub.”
“Come on, Lolly.”
“I had a few jars on me! Some pub we called in to, near Baggot Street. I don’t know. I never said a word to her. He says to me-”
“Who says?”
“Painless. Says to me, ‘Not as nice as her family album.’ Nudge nudge, wink wink, like.”
“And you remembered her.”
“So? You would too. If you were normal.”
“Where’d you see the pictures?”
“I don’t know. Some place. Something to do with Ali Baba. What do you call it?”
“The forty thieves?”
“Fuck, I don’t know! It was a couple of years ago.”
“Okay. Some place called Ali Baba’s. What is it, a knocking-shop? A club?”
