I’m not as tough as you. I’ve delivered beatings with the best of them, but I’ve never killed. I don’t want to kill anyone, not even Oweny Farrell.’
‘How did you think this was going to end?’
‘I don’t know: with a sit-down, maybe, with everybody compromising. I thought Joey Tuna would see us right. I thought-’
‘You thought what: that you were dealing with reasonable men?’ There was no mockery to Dempsey’s tone. He merely sounded tired, and there was a horror in his voice at what he had allowed himself to become.
‘No,’ said Ryan. ‘Just men. Just ordinary men.’
‘They were never ordinary, Francis. Ordinary men lead ordinary lives, but not them. They all had blood on their hands and on their souls. We’re tainted by it too, just by being around them.’
‘Have you killed, Martin?’
Now he turned to look at the older man. Ryan had heard stories: Dempsey worked alone, and the people he took care of didn’t surface again. Wherever they were, they were buried deep. Now Ryan wanted to hear confirmation from Dempsey’s own mouth.
‘Yes,’ said Dempsey. His eyes were empty.
‘For Tommy?’
‘And before Tommy.’
‘Who did you kill, Martin? Who did you kill before?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
But it did. It mattered to Ryan. Dempsey was born in Belmont, but he’d come to them from abroad. The whispers were that he’d been a bomb-maker, that he’d planted devices in Northern Ireland for the Provisionals, and in Madrid for the ETA Basques. Now he couldn’t return to Europe because, even with some form of peace established in both conflicts, there were those with long memories and scores to settle. Tommy had given him a home and a role to play, and Dempsey’s reputation had gone before him when there were problems that needed to be handled.
Before Ryan could question him further, Dempsey spoke again.
‘You say you’ve never killed, Francis. You say that you can’t. But before all this is over you may be put in a position where you have to pull the trigger on someone to save yourself. Have you thought about that?’
‘Yes,’ said Ryan. ‘I’ve thought about it. I even dream about it.’
‘And in the dreams, do you pull the trigger?’
Dempsey waited for the answer, the only light coming from the lamp on the table, its glow catching the sharp, glittering spikes of the tacks.
‘Yes,’ said Ryan at last. ‘I pull the trigger.’
‘Then maybe you can kill after all. Who do you kill in your dreams?’
‘Faceless men. I don’t know who they are.’
‘But you kill them anyway?’
‘Yes.’
‘What about me?’ said Dempsey. ‘Would you kill me in your dreams? Do you kill me in your dreams?’
Ryan had come this far. There was no point in turning back now.
‘I’ve thought about it.’
‘Not dreamed it, but thought it?’
‘Yes.’
And Dempsey saw that Ryan’s hand was within striking distance of whatever was lodged in his waistband, and the reality of all that Ryan had said hung in the air between them like a white handkerchief waiting to be dropped on a dueling field.
‘It’s all right, Francis,’ said Dempsey. ‘I know you have. I’ve seen it in your eyes.’ He moved the shoebox slightly with his left hand, shielding his right from view. ‘But I’m not the enemy here. Whatever you might think of me, I’m not the one you have to fear. If we turn against each other now, we’ll do their work for them. We have to trust each other, because we have nobody else.’
Ryan took in his words, still uncertain. ‘You frighten me sometimes, Martin. You take it too far. That woman the other night, she didn’t deserve what you did to her. No woman deserves that.’
‘But you didn’t try to stop it.’
‘I should have. I was weak.’
‘No, you’re not weak. It’s not weakness to avoid the battle that you can’t win. That’s just common sense. And what was she to you? Nothing. Nobody. You look out for your own, and let the others swim or die.’
Ryan’s right hand was still hidden.
‘So where does that leave us, Francis?’ said Dempsey. ‘Where do we stand?’
The cigarette bounced in Ryan’s fingers. A clump of ash fell to the carpet. It distracted Ryan from his thoughts. Instinctively, he moved, extending one foot to stamp on it. Dempsey glimpsed his right hand. There was no gun. Dempsey’s eyes flicked to the side and glimpsed Ryan’s gun by the sink, left there when he went to clean the glasses that they’d used earlier.
Now Ryan glanced his way. He saw the gun, and Dempsey’s fingers brushing its burnished steel, and the cold light in Dempsey’s eyes.
‘Jesus,’ he said.
‘It was nothing personal, Francis. You were just sounding a bit strange.’
Ryan let out a long, straggly breath. ‘I was only talking.’
‘I couldn’t see your hand.’
‘You were going to kill me.’
‘If I was going to, then I would have. I don’t want to kill you, Francis. I like you. And I told you, we have to stick together, for our sakes and for Tommy’s. If we don’t do this, they’ll pounce. Don’t think you’ll be able to cut a deal with them, because you won’t. We’ve stayed with Tommy too long. They’d never be able to rest or turn their backs on us. They’d always be wondering, doubting, and in time they’d put an end to their concerns because it would be easier that way. It’s all or nothing now. If we send out a strong enough message, we can make them reconsider. We take out Oweny, take out his crew, and suddenly the tables are turned.’
‘They’ll want revenge,’ said Ryan.
‘No, not if it’s just Oweny and his people who suffer. They’ll understand that they made a mistake, that they should have backed Tommy and not him. It’s about a show of strength. It has to be brutal, and it has to be final.’
Ryan walked to the table and looked down at the device. He picked up a carpet tack and held it to the light, examining it the way an entomologist might examine an unfamiliar yet clearly dangerous insect.
‘Joey Tuna offered me a way out,’ said Martin. ‘This morning, when we were talking, he asked me to rat on Tommy. He told me I could walk away if I made the call and let them know where Tommy could be found.’
‘And me?’
‘He didn’t mention you, Francis.’
Ryan nodded. He understood. They would have killed him just to be sure.
‘What did you say to him?’
‘Nothing. I’m here, aren’t I? I’m with Tommy, and I’m with you. We’re different, you and I, but we need to stick together on this. And remember, you’re not killing anyone. I made this, and I’ll put it in position. The blood will be on my hands, the mark on my soul.’
Ryan twisted the tack one last time, then dropped it in the shoebox.
‘No,’ he said. ‘It’ll be on my soul too.’
And now here they were, the rain pattering on the roof of the car, no lights within to expose them, the device on the floor at Dempsey’s feet. Ryan couldn’t help but think of it as a living creature, a monster in the box waiting to be unleashed. They should have bored air holes in it so it could breathe. He could almost hear the beating of its heart.
In an ideal situation Dempsey would have planted the device earlier, but the bar was Oweny’s place, and there was no way that he could gain access to it in advance. The bar was small, and it would contain the blast. In the confined space, the device’s effects would be catastrophic. The problem was getting it in there. He’d told Ryan that he planned to take the simple approach. In one hand was a brick, in the other the device. The brick would take out
