“Back years ago,” Minogue replied. “When they were starting out.”
“One of the Interview ones, I’ll never forget it. About an unconscious thing: wanting to unburden yourself. Wanting to tell, needing to tell, like the punishing parent thing. Guilt. Do you believe that?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well just remember this, Matt: there’s two sides to it. The more I tell you, the more hangs on your decision. You aren’t going to walk away from this tonight if you can’t persuade me. And you’re deciding for him there in the boot, you hear?”
Minogue let his hand rest, but Little was suspicious now.
“Get your hands up there on the wheel where I can see them.”
Minogue geared down instead of braking for the traffic ahead.
“Shaughnessy: O’Riordan dumped it down on Daly. Tit for tat: after all, Daly owed him one for taking Smith out of the picture, didn’t he?”
For a moment, Minogue was back at the scene by the Strand Road all those months ago: the Fiat van peppered with automatic fire, the gray and crimson bits of Larry Smith’s head across the roadway.
“Daly knows everything about coming and going with the band,” said Little. “This Shaughnessy is going to drop the works on O’Riordan, because…?”
“O’Riordan and Leyne were partners in the old days,” Minogue said.
“You’ve got it,” said Little. “I told them you were going to come really close, Matt, to be ready. Christ… How things turn out. Yes, O’Riordan and Leyne were dealers. Years ago, but still too. There’s high finance and something to do with O’Riordan moving stuff for this fella. I wasn’t told exactly, but put two and two together and you can figure that O’Riordan had done stuff for Leyne under the table. The basics were that O’Riordan would be up the creek if the son started blathering. O’Riordan tells Daly to talk to him, see what can be done. At least buy time. But it looks bad. This young fella’s off the wall, he’s going to do anything. He puts the heavy hand on O’Riordan pretty quick, it ends up with me. So, it suddenly gets very simple. There’s a conversation to which I am party to. if O’Riordan goes, everything goes.”
He tested the elbows of his jacket. Minogue gripped the wheel tighter.
“You know what that would mean, do you?”
Minogue shook his head.
“I doubt that,” said Little. “Whether you do or not, it was O’Riordan got that crowd of wankers started up, Public Works. He was the money man. He’s in for half of them, what they make. Did you know that?”
“A half?” was all Minogue could think of saying.
“And here’s you and me holding the fort for people like that. So they can do their thing. So that crowd of scumbags can do whatever comes into their addled little minds to do. Millionaires. While me and you, and that gom in the back, walk the streets, or argue with our kids why they shouldn’t pay twenty quid to go to a concert where they’re going to be hanging around with ten thousand other iijits who’ll shove drugs their way. Ever thought about that, have you?”
“I’m not sure — ”
“Ah, quit the pretending, Matt! The whole duty thing, the decency thing — what you and me grew up with as part of our bloody genes — the pay-your-way, rear the family, save your money, be polite — that it’s all a fucking con?”
Minogue glanced at him.
“Keep going there. Yeah, through Sutton Cross. O’Riordan’s is up Thormanbury Road there. His palace. Where was I? Shaughnessy. So yes, if that’s what you’re asking. I went out to get him. Outside of Lacy’s Pub there in Kinnegad. He’d had the sense to lay low awhile there, but was up in a heap when I got there. He actually asked me if I could put him in touch with someone who’d sell him coke. Me, a policeman…! And I knew this prick had murdered a woman. He’d promised her the sun, moon, and stars to get ahold of this rock. His da would pay this and his da would do that — and then he starts in on me, what he’d pay, what his da would do for me. I just about nailed him then. I got him out to a place the far end of Inchicore. A lockup there. Told him we had to hide it until I took care of his car and everything. That I had a fella waiting to bring it into the airport. I don’t know if he believed me or not. Look: he didn’t know what hit him. And the airport? I’ve been in and out of there a half a dozen times since Christmas. Training runs, we have to work up to the standards coming in from Brussels now, the new standards. Thank you, Eurocrats. Can you credit that, they have regulations on Civil Defense emergency communications, and we fall under that too. Anyway. I know me way around the airport. Happy?”
A fine mist began to glisten on the windscreen. Little reached over and flicked the wiper stalk.
“Get a move on,” he said. “And turn up the radio, if they’re looking for you.”
The reflective stripes on the side of the squad car ahead were nudging out from a driveway ahead. Little stared.
“Who the hell are these fellas?”
“I don’t know,” Minogue said.
“Hey,” said Little. He took the gun out from under his jacket. “You didn’t call for checkpoints, did you?”
Minogue shook his head. The back of his neck prickled.
“What have you done? Did you call this?”
Minogue eased his foot off the accelerator. The ache he’d felt growing under his arms vanished.
“I didn’t,” he said.
“Two I can see,” said Little. “There’s one up there on a car. There must be more of them. What is this? Breathalyzers, this time of year?”
The Guard with the flashlight was decked out in the reflective coat for spotchecks. Two cars had parked the footpath the far side of the checkpoint. A Rover, it looked like, a Fiat.
“There was a — that woman was killed last month,” said Little. “Out walking, her and her husband, the hit and run?”
He tugged his coat out from behind him to cover the gun again.
“Get out your card,” he said.
For a moment Minogue thought the noise was the engine. Malone groaned again. Little turned.
“Shut up, Tommy!” Little shouted. “So help me, I’ll blow your brains out!”
Minogue’s fingers slid across the top edge of his wallet. His chest was locked tight. He had to remember to breathe. Malone seemed to be moving now.
“Not a word, Tommy!” said Little. “And don’t move an inch. This is for keeps tonight.”
“He has claustraphobia, Damian — ”
“I don’t give a flying — ”
There was panic in Little’s eyes. He lifted out his wallet and thumbed it open.
“Christ,” Little hissed. “What’s he waving us in for? Can’t he spot an unmarked?”
He nudged Minogue’s arm with the pistol.
“Don’t play hero, Matt. There’s a lot in this tonight — I’ve got them where I want them for this. All of them: O’Riordan, those fucking stars — There’ll be no more after this, no need — and you can be part of this, you and Tommy. But I’ll do what I have to do, no matter what. You hear that, Tommy? Did you? There’s plenty for everyone in this, so think about that, you hear me?”
Minogue geared down to second. Little took two deep breaths and sat back. Minogue let his fingers off the card.
“Damn.”
“What?”
“I dropped me card.”
“You — where? The gearshift, where?”
“Let me see.”
His fingers ran over the end of the handbrake and dropped to the carpet. Nothing. Little leaned against the door to watch.
“It’s all right, just leave it,” he said. “Give him mine! Stop it! Just leave it there, for Christ’s sake. Come on, here he is.”
The Guard had stepped out in the road. He stared in at the two. Minogue’s fingernails slid along the carpet. Tiny pebbles, he registered, grit, a cigarette butt.
