Himself(87)

It is of Mahony. Striding the stage in his tight britches with his dark eyes smiling. He is laughing at him.

By degrees Father Quinn crawls out from under the table and, seeing Michael Hopper’s bag of tools lying next to the back door, arms himself with a hammer. He edges over to the countertop, drags himself up and summons all his remaining strength.

By mid-morning Father Eugene Quinn slithers from a broken window into a rose bush. It’s a difficult birth.

The priest lies blinking up at the clouds, froth collecting at the corners of his mouth. Then he turns himself over, drags himself up and limps off down the garden path.

Drugged, trouserless and howling for revenge.





Chapter 52


May 1976


In the village hall Shauna switches on the tea urn and butters a few scones. Just because they’re running a covert operation there’s no reason not to be comfortable. The others pull chairs around the foot of the stage. No one smiles.

Mrs Cauley lends a funereal air to the proceedings, dressed in black bombazine like an elderly crow, her bandaged face pale and regal above a lace collar. She has taken one of her most dramatic wigs out of retirement; it is her judgement day wig, she says. Johnnie steps down off the stage and, with a look of concentration, tries to pet it. The wig, a formidable black beehive, edges away of its own accord until Mrs Cauley reaches a hand up to straighten it.

She peers out through her dressings. ‘So, Doosey, can you confirm that our target is currently ensconced in the garda station?’

Bridget pats the binoculars on her lap. ‘He is, the murdering bastard.’

‘Then let’s synchronise our watches.’ Mrs Cauley draws an ancient pocket watch from the folds of her cape and passes it to Mahony.

Mahony turns it over in his hands. It’s gold, remarkably fine and engraved with the initials J. M. S. When he flicks the catch with his thumbnail, the casement opens as smoothly as a beetle’s wings.

He glances up at Mrs Cauley. ‘It reads half past five.’

Behind her Johnnie withdraws his watch from his waistcoat pocket. He taps it and gives it a shake.

Shauna rolls her eyes. ‘It’s a quarter past eleven.’

Mrs Cauley nods. ‘Mahony, are you ready?’

‘I am.’

At twenty minutes past eleven, refusing a package of sandwiches and a flask of tea from Shauna, Mahony exits the west-facing door of the village hall. He takes the back road to Kerrigan’s Bar and sees no one. He enters the saloon door at twenty-four minutes past eleven. Tadhg is stacking bottles of lemonade behind the bar. Mahony asks the crack of Tadhg’s arse if he can have a lend of the car. The crack says he can of course but it’s full of chickens. Mahony thanks the crack and runs out of the back door.

At twenty-seven minutes past eleven, Jack Brophy receives a visit, in person, at the station, from Mrs Cauley and Bridget Doosey. Bridget Doosey, having manoeuvred Mrs Cauley’s wheelchair in the door, takes a seat in the corner of the room and clamps a pair of interrogatory eyes on the guard. From time to time she whistles in an attempt to appear nonchalant.

At thirty-four minutes past eleven, Mahony is still attempting to start Tadhg’s car. Chickens are falling out of the open door and skidding along the bonnet. There’s a cockerel in the footwell shitting on the accelerator and two hens roosting on the dashboard. Mahony ignores them; he is listening to the engine in despair. This time it really is terminal.

At thirty-eight minutes past eleven, Mahony goes back inside Kerrigan’s and grabs a set of keys from the hook behind the bar. He cuts out and around the back of the pub and runs to the garage, passing the doorway where Father Eugene Quinn sits sucking his fingers and rocking. Father Quinn opens his eyes and clocks Mahony. It is twenty to twelve.

Mahony has the garage door open in moment.

And time stops.

There, in front of him, is Tadhg Kerrigan’s 1956 Cadillac Eldorado Seville: a two-door coupé the blue of a cloudless afternoon. Her headlamps widen in surprise as Mahony reaches out to touch her bright flank. She is polished to a mirror, all curves and dazzling chrome.

She starts first time and turns over with the bass purr of a chain-smoking tiger. She is halfway out of the garage when Father Quinn jumps in front of her like a bollox.

The car clips the priest and sends him spinning, so that when Mahony looks in his rear-view mirror he sees the priest flat on his arse with his fist up in the air, like a figure from a comic book.

To his credit, Father Quinn picks himself up and gives chase as Mahony swings the Eldorado out onto the Castleross road wondering why the priest is wearing little more than his underpants.

Shauna is manning the headquarters at the village hall. She has drunk six cups of tea and broken a milk jug. She has swept and washed the floor and cleaned the windows. She has had a good go at the cobwebs with a tea towel tied to a broom and has restacked the chairs. She has cut a mountain of sandwiches and rinsed out the dishcloths.

She resumes her position behind the serving hatch, where she eats another biscuit, absentmindedly, with her eyes riveted to the door.

The statement is taking far longer than anyone would expect, given that Mrs Cauley didn’t see the suspect properly, can’t remember the precise look or contents of her purse and has no real idea regarding the time of the theft.

Nevertheless her recollection of theatrical anecdotes is second to none today.