“Yeah, right, man. Sure. But you’re running in the wrong direction.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean? It’s easy to judge people, isn’t it? Oh, yeah. So easy.” Tierney turned to him.
“Look, Leonardo. I don’t know if you really listen to anyone. Get this through your head: Nobody trusts a junkie.”
“I’m not a fucking junkie, Jammy. Don’t call me that.”
“Oh, yeah? You could quit cold turkey any time, right? Sure, man. Prove it. Sort yourself out and maybe someone might take you seriously.”
“They take Mary seriously and you know what she does-”
Tierney suddenly jabbed him hard in the chest.
“Shut up, man! I can just about put up with you lying about yourself but-”
“I was only saying that she gets to do-”
Tierney grasped his collar and twisted it.
“I don’t want to hear it, you lying bastard.”
Tierney shoved him away.
“I can do it, Jammy. Whatever it is. Swear to God.”
Tierney looked into the startled eyes again.
“What the hell are you talking about? Do what?”
“Whatever it takes, Jammy. I’m good! I’ve done stuff. Tell them, okay? Will you?”
THREE
Minogue’s back was prickly. A cyclist wearing only shorts and runners and a Walkman dawdled by their parked car. “181,” said Malone. Minogue looked at the flowers and the fresh paint. A dozen feet of brown lawn ran from the low pebble-dash wall to the house. Neighbours to one side of 181 had begun what might have looked like a rockery had they not lost interest. A Hi-Ace van squatted on cement blocks at the far end of the street.
Music with a disco beat sounded against the door. Minogue knocked harder. The chain pulled tight as the door opened. A woman with tied-up hair and sharp black lines on her eyebrows peered out. He pegged her for forty, for someone who didn’t like that one bit, for someone willing to fight it tooth and nail. She gave him a once-over and looked to Malone behind.
“The windows, is it?”
“No, ma’am. I’m looking for a Mrs. Irene Mullen.”
“No. No Irene Mullen here.”
She had said it too brashly for Minogue not to notice.
“Aren’t yous the Corpo come to fix the windows? I called them a fortnight ago.”
Her eyes kept moving from Minogue to Malone and back.
“Do you know a Mrs. Mullen?”
“Who’s asking?”
“Sorry. My name is Minogue. I’m a Guard. Matt Minogue.”
“That so? Where’s your ID.”
She barely looked at the photocard. Her eyes narrowed.
“I’m here about Mary Mullen.” He fixed her with a glare. “She’s the daughter, you know.”
“You’re wasting your time then, aren’t you? She doesn’t live here.”
“This is her last known address. There was no phone number. We drove out to check.”
The sun was on his bald spot now.
“Well, now you know,” she said, and closed the door. He strolled back to the car and leaned against it. Two youths emerged from a house up the street. They took their time walking toward the two policemen. Malone watched them, scratching his forearm.
“She’s trying to put one by us,” he murmured.
The youths stopped by a wall in front of one of the houses, lit cigarettes and stared at the policemen. A motorbike cruised by, turned around and stopped. The driver kicked out the stand, switched off the engine and stood next to the two by the wall.
“I wonder if our timing mightn’t be a bit off,” said Minogue. “We could come back with a posse, I reckon.”
A Post van appeared at the top of the road. Minogue saw the curtains in the upper floor of the house stir. He waved the van down. The driver was a middle-aged man with heavy jowls and a cigarette burning close to his knuckles. Beads of sweat high up on the driver’s forehead competed with a face full of large scattered freckles for the Inspector’s attention. Minogue’s eyes kept wandering to the wiry tufts of ginger hair sticking out over the man’s ears. He held up his card to the open window.
“Howiya there now. I’m a Guard and I’m looking for someone.”
The driver returned his hand to the gear shift.
“Well, good for you, pal. I’m not.”
“No-wait, I mean. It’s not the way it sounds. There’s been a death in the family. I’m trying to locate next of kin for someone.”
The driver thumbed his chin. The cigarette stayed in place against his knuckles.
“Yeah?”
Minogue’s eye went from the sceptical Dubliner behind the wheel back to the three youths. The man had taken him for a Guard trying to pin a warrant on someone.
“I was looking for a Mullen, Irene Mullen. I don’t know about a Mister Mullen, just her. She was here four years ago.”
The driver stared down into the wheel-well by the passenger seat and then back at Minogue.
“One of her family?”
“I’m afraid so. Do you know her?”
The eyes darted to the house Minogue had just left and he nodded once.
“She said there was no one that name there.”
“Who was it?” His hand moved the gear shift slowly from side to side in neutral.
“I don’t know who she is or says she is-”
“I mean the person what’s dead.”
“Well now, we’d prefer to pass the news on to the next of kin first.”
The hand stopped abruptly and the driver’s face set into a hard expression.
“Get a bit of cop on, for Christ’s sake,” he said.
Minogue took a step back from the van.
“Don’t you get it? I’m taking a chance here just talking to you. I’m the only one that comes through here now, Chief. You won’t even get the Corpo repairmen or the gas and meter fellas without an escort. The people here know me, man. Do you get it? I just deliver letters here like I done this last twenty-three years. I know me onions.”
“What are you saying?”
He jerked the ignition off and opened the door.
“Don’t they speak English down in Cork?”
“Clare. And I’m here thirty years if you need to be asking.”
The driver was nearly a foot shorter than Minogue.
“Let me tell you something, Chief. One year here is longer than thirty of yours.”
He shoved his fingers of his left hand in his mouth and whistled. The sound, a skill Minogue assumed was specific only to Dublin corner-boys, was piercing.
“Oi!” the driver called out. “Crunchie! Oi!”
The motorcyclist stood away from his bike and lifted his helmet. His face was a rash of acne. He shook out his hair as he walked over. The Post driver spoke with him and then walked to the door of the house. Crunchie
