Nine Inches Page 11

  ‘On my own husband?’

  ‘He’s screwing around behind your back.’

  ‘I’m resigned to that.’ I raised an eyebrow. ‘Y’know, you’re like fuckin’ Roger Moore when you do that, except you’re a better actor. Dan, I can’t just go hoking through his stuff.’

  ‘Why not? Listen to me.’ I reached out and took her hand. Or tried to. It was meant to emphasise my point, but it was the hand with her fag in it and she burned my palm by mistake and I said, ‘Fuck!’ and rubbed at it.

  ‘Sorry! Here . . . let me . . .’

  She took hold of it and kissed the burn and then held it against her cheek. There were tears in her eyes. I let her hold it for a few moments, then gradually drew it away and let it drop to her shoulder.

  ‘Tracey,’ I said, ‘you need to help me. I’ve been involved in crap like this before and my experience is this: he may look happy, he may sound happy, but if you get into something that involves your own child being kidnapped, then you are not dealing with normal people and it is unlikely to end happily. And I have worked with media people before, and as a rule of thumb, the less demanding their job, the larger their ego. He will think he can deal with this because he is Jack Caramac off the radio, with the highest listenership in Ireland, but it will mean nothing to the people who might eventually put a bolt through his head.’

  ‘I know. I know. I know. I have thought all this. I could just up sticks, take Jimmy away, keep him safe.’

  ‘Yes, you could.’

  ‘Except.’

  ‘You love Jack.’

  ‘Yes, I do.’

  I nodded some myself.

  ‘Love’s a bitch, isn’t it?’ I asked.

  ‘No,’ said Tracey, ‘love is great.’

  ‘That’s my girl,’ I said, ‘metaphorically speaking.’

  I walked back to the office with the full intention of making some calls, sat down, put my feet up on the desk and dozed off. I was out for three hours. I woke groggy and stiff and with a mild headache. I necked some paracetamol, drained a warm Diet Coke and tried to decide if I was sober enough yet to drive home. Only a few years back it wouldn’t have mattered. I have driven while spectacularly drunk and never actually killed anyone, though I did once bounce a nun off my bonnet. She just rolled off and kept walking. She’d either taken a vow of silence or I’d broken her throat.

  But times have changed. There wasn’t an exact method of working out when I would be sufficiently legal; it was guesswork.

  I went into the small bathroom and threw water on my face. I sucked on an emergency Polo mint. I lifted Bobby’s spare leg and walked to the car. Nobody mentioned the leg. The Lisburn Road was busy enough. I drove carefully. Guessing that it was what teenagers were most likely to want to eat, I stopped to pick up a bargain bucket of KFC. I drove on home with the windows down. St Anne’s Square’s piazza lights were just coming on. I parked. I nodded to a neighbour on the way up, and let myself into the apartment. It was very quiet. I called Bobby’s name. There was no response.

  ‘Hey, Bobby, you here? I went to Kentucky. Do you want a leg?’

  Still nothing. I went from room to room. Gone. I checked my valuables. TV, present; PC, present. There was a dirty plate in the sink and a sodden towel on the bathroom floor. I picked it up and put it over a radiator. I checked the spare bedroom – not slept in. So, he’d done a runner, or, at least, a hopper. Maybe it was no bad thing. I wasn’t equipped to deal with any teenager, let alone a one-legged drug dealer whose mother had just died. I set his leg appendage down on the counter. Maybe he had spares dotted all over the city, like Scott on his way to the Pole, who didn’t have legs, but supply dumps. That hadn’t ended so well. But it wasn’t my problem.

  I looked at the KFC. If I ate anything else dripping in fat, I really would implode. I left it sitting there and went to the cupboard above the sink. A healthy dose of Black Bush was in order.

  There had been a three-quarters-full bottle, but it was gone. As I discovered this, I heard a groan. It did not come from me, though it should have. I turned and surveyed the open-plan kitchen and lounge. My eyes were drawn to the veranda. The curtains were still closed from the night before, but one of them was flapping gently in the breeze.

  Another groan.

  I moved across to the sliding doors, pulled the curtains back and saw Bobby, naked, on his hands and knee. He was throwing up. There was my bottle of whiskey, empty, on the ground beside him.

  Christ.

  I opened the door and went out. His head turned very slightly.

  ‘Sorry . . . sorry . . . sorry . . .’

  I knelt beside him, reluctantly, and said, ‘It’s okay . . .’ through gritted teeth.

  ‘I’m not drunk . . .’

  ‘I can see that . . . C’mon . . .’

  I tried to pick him up. He was heavier than he looked. Dead weights always are. I levered him straight-ish and balanced him against my shoulder.

  ‘Lean on me,’ I said, and tried not to hum it.

  I tried to shuffle him forward.

  ‘Can’t . . . can’t . . . fuckin’ . . . gonna . . .’

  He threw up down my arm. My natural and understandable response was to step away from him, which I did, leaving him to topple in the opposite direction. He reached out for support, and I caught hold of him and pulled him back towards me, and in the same fluid movement he sprayed me again, and then fell into me, and we both fell backwards, slathered in boke, on to the cement. Horrified, and about to hurl myself, I shoved him hard, and he slithered off and cracked his head on the ground and threw up again. I lay there, simultaneously gasping for fresh breath and trying not to breathe in, and it was only a new sound from him that turned my head in concern: big, aching sobs. They were so powerful that they made the heaves of his boking seem tame.

  I didn’t know whether to crawl over and give him a hug, or break out the power hose.

  I poured large amounts of coffee and Diet Coke down his ragged throat. He sat on the sofa with a basin in his lap and his head drooped, saying nothing, while I showered the stench off me. Then I gave him his leg and told him to go shower again. He attached it, and moved meekly towards the bathroom.

  I stood at the kitchen counter, a towel around my waist, and just shook my head in disbelief. I had volunteered for this. He was nothing to do with me. I was not responsible for him or his predicament, unless you wanted to be really, really pedantic. He could sober up and he could fuck off.

  The door bell sounded.

  I remained where I was. I was harbouring a child whom ruthless terrorists were looking for. I had no way of knowing if Boogie Wilson had mentioned me to the Miller brothers or if they were even aware I existed. But only that morning I had very definitely been seen to be in Bobby’s company, and had probably been spotted driving off with him, by a cleaver-wielding butcher who had strong ties to prison and the Shankill Road. It would not have taken a genius to track us back here. It was still a remote possibility, but I decided to err on the cautious side and ignore it, at least until the bell rang again and Lenny said through the door, ‘Dan? Are you there? I saw your car outside. I know you’re angry with me, but please let me in.’

  It wasn’t anger, it was relief. I opened up and she fell into my arms. She peppered me with kisses and paid particular attention to my eye, which had blackened like an overripe banana.

  ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ she cried.

  ‘It’s okay,’ I said, patting her back, ‘it’s okay.’

  ‘No it’s not, he could have killed you.’

  ‘No he couldn’t, I’m indestructible.’

  More kisses. Then she held me at arm’s length and said, ‘I’m so sorry. When he said he was taking the kids up the coast, it was all a lie. He was watching me. Watching us. He followed us here. He confronted me when I got home. There was nothing I could do but admit it, and then he wouldn’t let me leave or phone or anything.’

  ‘Did he hurt you?’

  ‘No.
He wouldn’t. But he wanted to hurt you.’

  ‘Him and his pals.’

  She frowned. ‘He had help?’

  ‘Did you think one man could pin me down?’ I smiled. ‘Don’t answer that.’

  ‘Oh baby, I’m really sorry.’

  ‘Does he know you’re here now?’

  ‘No, of course not. He dropped me off at work. Soon as he drove off, I came here. What are we going to do?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said.

  We sat on the sofa. She leant back against my bare chest and kissed it. ‘I can’t give you up,’ she said.

  I nodded. I could see her point.

  ‘We’ll work something out,’ I said.

  She stroked my arm. After a little while she said, ‘I saw your car. Someone has scratched paedophile into it, though I don’t think it’s spelled properly.’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘The state of our education . . .’

  Before I could finish, and with perfect timing, the bathroom door opened, and my fourteen-year-old mostly naked guest, with steam still rising from his body, limped across to the kitchen counter, lifted the KFC bargain bucket, and returned swiftly to the bathroom without once looking in our direction.

  As the door closed I said, ‘I can explain.’

  21

  In east Belfast, a taxi driver with known connections to Boogie Wilson was shot in the back of the head by a passenger and died at the wheel. On the Shankill, two associates of the Miller brothers were cornered and kneecapped by an armed gang who arrived in a minibus that was later found burned out in the shadow of the shipyard. In St Anne’s Square, a fourteen-year-old with a tremendous hangover slept it off in my spare bed. In the Bob Shaw, a confused barmaid started the new day shift her sullen, bitter husband had insisted she switch to. On the Malone Road, I sat in my big scratched car watching Jack Caramac’s opulent home, the road ahead of me busy with early-morning schools traffic, and thought about the meaning of wife.

  Jack was being a bastard to Tracey, yet she stayed for love. She had promised to help me to help him. I had, undoubtedly, been a bastard in my time as well, yet Patricia had thrown me as far as she could throw me. What was so wrong with me that I wasn’t worth sticking with? Or what was so wrong with Tracey that she didn’t feel she could leave someone who cheated on her? Who was right? Did two rights make a wrong? Was a bird in the hand worth two in the bush? Sometimes you can ponder too much. I have this fantasy where I’m like a shark, always moving forward, while at the same time being totally aware that I’m more like a goldfish, going round and round and round in an eternal quest for crumbs. I always forget what my reality is the moment something new and shiny comes along. I get inexplicably excited and hopeful all over again, convinced that love and lust and peace and happiness are all just around the corner. I should have There are no corners in a goldfish bowl tattooed on to my forehead.

  Focus.

  Jack was on air, and Tracey was supposed to be finding out stuff. I had no reason to believe that she would recognise something important if she found it, but she wouldn’t let me in to do it myself. I was used to trawling for information, it was part of what I did, but she was adamant. She said she would call me if she had anything to report. She had no idea I was outside. It was good to have her on my side, but not good to keep all my eggs in one basket. Not when I could be keeping an eye on Nanny the nanny as she left at the end of what must have been an overnight shift. She was wearing an anorak, zipped right up; she took a cigarette out as soon as she was halfway down the drive, but didn’t light up until she actually left the property. She turned right, moved along the footpath parallel to the Caramac hedge, and on to the end of the garden of the half-built house next door. She stopped there and waited. She lit another fag. She had earphones in. Ten minutes passed, and then a silver-coloured Ford Mondeo pulled up beside her. There was a woman with blonde permed hair behind the wheel. Nanny got in, and they drove off. I followed.

  It was unlikely to be the silver car, but if it was, and the blonde was the woman who had nabbed Jimmy, then it was a pretty bloody amateurish operation. But then writing Shut the fuck up on a scrap of paper was hardly the height of sophistication. Was it possible that Jack, and Jimmy, for that matter, had been taken for a ride by their own nanny? And what did it say about my half-arsed attempts to investigate the case that I hadn’t grasped the bleeding obvious? Had Nanny the nanny outfoxed me by the simple expedient of not talking to me?

  I started the car, and followed. Jack was still waxing lyrical. He was on health service cuts and castigating the Department of Health for not providing a spokesman to be annihilated live on air. I followed the car down the full length of the Malone Road until it turned into Chlorine Gardens and wound its way round to Colenso Parade. It was an area, and street, mainly inhabited by hard-partying Queen’s University students and resilient older folk. It took them a while to find a parking space. When they finally got one, I drove past them once, and then doubled back via Elaine Street and Sandhurst Gardens, just in time to see them enter a small red-brick terraced house with a black front door. Duly noted, I spent another ten minutes trying to find somewhere to park for myself. It’s never hard in the movies.

  I rang the bell. Nanny the nanny opened the door with a smile that faded when she saw me. She was still in her anorak.

  I said, ‘Hi, remember me?’

  She said, ‘What you want?’

  ‘Oh, thanks for asking. I want to come in for a chat with you and your partner. Is she your partner?’

  ‘I do not under—’

  ‘About you and your employer, Jack Caramac, and little Jimmy, your charge? Little fella, rosy cheeks? Can we talk about him? I’ll only be five minutes. Can I come in?’

  ‘No,’ she said and closed the door.

  I stood there, nodding to myself for a little bit, thinking about booking lessons at the charm school and how painful it would actually be to undergo surgery to have the cheeky bone extracted. Then I rang the bell again. This time it was the blonde woman who answered. Up close, she was a good deal older than Nanny, face lined, yellow teeth, bony legs in faded jeans. Actually, I was only surmising that she had bony legs.

  I said, ‘Hello, I’m—’

  ‘Fuck off!’

  ‘If you would just give me a—’

  ‘What don’t you understand about fuck off? Fuck off!’

  She slammed the door.

  I nodded for a little while longer. But I didn’t get where I was in life by taking no for an answer, so I crouched to letter-box level and pushed it open. I could see Nanny the nanny and Blondie standing together at the end of the hall.

  I said, ‘I only want to talk. Better you chat with me than with the police. I know what you did with little Jimmy; this isn’t going to end well unless you talk to me.’

  Blondie said, ‘You’re talking shite. Fuck away off. Or we call the police.’

  Not wanting to confuse the police, I said, ‘Go ahead.’

  She took out her mobile phone and moved out of sight.

  Nanny remained in the hallway. She drew on her fag.

  She said, ‘I haven’t done anything wrong.’

  But she looked like someone who knew she had and was in the early, middle and late stages of denial.

  Out of sight, Blondie said, ‘Don’t talk to him.’

  Nanny kept looking at me.

  I said, ‘Nobody else needs to know.’

  She began to shake her head. Blondie re-emerged, took her by the arm and pulled her into the side room. A moment later, Blondie came back out and moved down the hall. She crouched down beside the letter box. We were eye to eye and mouth to mouth. She stank of onions and cigarettes.

  She spoke quietly, as if not wanting Nanny to hear. ‘Do you have like a card or something, I can call you later?’

  I delved into my wallet and reached through the letter box. As I did, she grabbed my hand, sandwiched it between her elbow and ribcage and ground her lit cigarette into it.

 
I yelled and tried to pull away, but she held me tight, and she ground, and she ground and she fucking ground. I wailed like a banshee. I rammed my foot into the door and pushed hard, trying to use the leverage to rip my hand back out, but she’d too strong a grip.

  Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fucking FUCK!

  Abruptly she let go and I tumbled back on to her flag-stone path. I lay rubbing furiously at my smouldering hand while she cackled with laughter through the letter box, at least until she guldered: ‘Now piss away off!’

  22

  I was saying, ‘If God had meant men to iron . . .’ but wasn’t sure how to finish it.

  Trish was saying, ‘This is not an ironing burn. Tell me the truth.’

  ‘I’ve told you the truth.’

  ‘Please yourself.’ She dabbed and I jerked and she said, ‘Will you sit still!’

  ‘Then stop fuckin’ stabbin’ me, it’s sore enough without you!’

  ‘Did I ask you to come here?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Then shut up and sit still.’ She took a firmer grip on my hand. ‘You should go to the hospital with this.’

  ‘It’s fine.’

  ‘It’s not fine. Dan, I know you, you’re not being brave, you’re just scared of hospitals.’

  ‘So? You’re scared of . . . commitment.’

  ‘Hah! Don’t start me, Dan, please don’t start me.’ She shook her head. ‘Seriously, this is really deep.’

  ‘I know. But please, just . . . you know, do what you do.’

  She held my gaze, then nodded and continued her work. We were in the kitchen on bar stools on either side of a counter. It was warm and bright and smelled of fresh pastry. It most probably came from a spray. Trish could hardly boil an egg. It had once been my home, and now it wasn’t. Even looking around the kitchen I could see that much of my accumulated clutter was gone. I was being spring-cleaned out of her life.

  I said, ‘Big house, this. I used to have one just like it.’

  ‘You still have.’

  ‘Plenty of space. Spare bedrooms and the like.’

  ‘Dan, just say what you’re going to say, just ask what you’re going to ask, I hate it when you beat around the bush.’