The Ghosts of Galway (Jack Taylor)(4)

Speculation on it being a shortened form of an Irish word led nowhere. It seemed obvious that it stood for … flogging a dead horse.

Or was that just too facile?

Set a priest to catch a priest. Father Malachy was my dead mother’s pet, a practice back then of pious ladies adopting a tame cleric and having him in tow to demonstrate their holiness. My mother was one mean, wicked bitch and that she had this idiot in thrall spoke volumes as to the characters of them both. He loathed me, agreed with my mother’s description of me … as a useless drunk.

Our paths continued to cross. One memorable time I even saved his arse from serious allegations of indecency. Was he grateful?

Was he fuck!

He was the most determined smoker on the planet. No electronic capers for him. Despite all sorts of upheavals, he managed to cling to the shreds of his parish. Just a prayer ahead of the lynch mob. I hadn’t been to Bohermore for a time and had near forgotten the warmth and goodness of a real neighborhood. I stopped at a new off license, bought a bottle of Paddy. Malachy was truly old school in his whiskey. A man in a flat cap, donkey jacket, his nose beet red from booze hailed me with, “Jesus, Taylor, you’re alive.”

A new corruption of language was the young people answering any question with

Basically.

They used it without rhyme or reason. I looked at the man, said,

“Basically.”

St. Patrick’s Church was the parish I grew up in, back in the days when the church ruled. Now it was simply a small church with smaller aspirations. I went to the house beside it, knocked, waited. Door opened by a housekeeper in her very battered fifties and with a scowl that was set in the ’40s.

“What?”

She barked.

“Good morning, my dear,”

I tried.

Phew-oh.

Good was not an adjective she had ever met and seemed unlikely to adopt now. I added, “May I see the parish priest?”

“No.”

Terse but concise.

She went to close the door, but my boot prevented that. She near spat.

“What is that?”

Staring at my foot.

In a very polite voice, I near whispered,

“That, darlin’, is my shoe, which I shall put so far up your arse you will scream hallellaia or such like.”

“You …

You’re not right in the head.”

No argument there and I did the thing that freaks the very best of them.

I smiled.

Father Malachy looked fierce. In both senses of the word, angry and fucked. A wreath of smoke hung like bad news above his head. He snarled, “Taylor.”

Warmth.

I handed over the bottle of Paddy and, without even looking at it, he put it in a drawer. I asked, “We’re not having a drink?”

He lit a cig, blew smoke at me, said,

“’Tis drink has you in the state you’re in.”

So, business as usual.

I said,

“You might be of some help to me.”

He laughed with no hint of humor, plain bitterness, said,

“What’s in it for me?”

Christ.

I said,

“Clerical satisfaction.”

He looked like he might spit, said,

“Whoever sold you that lie is a Protestant.”

The worst insult in priestly lore. I persisted.

“I was thinking of putting some euros to the roof fund. He smiled, said,

“Now we’re talking.”

Handed over a few notes and they joined the bottle in the drawer. He gritted,

“What do you want?”

“A priest, ex actually, named Frank Miller.”

Right on cue, he said,

“Sin City.”

How could he know that?

I asked,

“How could you know that?”

He made the humph sound, said,

“I have Amazon Prime.”

I shook my head. Life still had surprises. He added,

“I’m a big Mickey Rourke fan.”

Saw my jaw drop, said,

“There’s many say I have the look of him.”

For fuck’s sake.

I asked,

“After the plastic surgery fiascos?”

He ground the cig on the floor. I understood why the housekeeper was like a demon. Then, “Call me in a day and I’ll see what I can find.”

I tired.

“Thanks.”

He said,

“May need some more cash.”

I sighed.

“The roof?”

He sneered.

“Nothing wrong with the roof, it’s solid, like the papacy.”

I was leaving when he said,

“You had some kind of Goth girl in tow, a heathen I hear?”

Emily.

I said,

“You’re well informed.”

He waved a dismissive hand, said,

“People think I have some interest in you because I knew your sainted mother. I don’t.”

No reply to this.

He added, almost like he’d near forgotten,

“The girl, someone kicked fifty kinds of murder out of her.”

“What?”

He stared at me, said,

“You’re not deaf.”

Well, kind of, actually.