A Carra King Read online

  Praise for John Brady’s

  MATT MINOGUE series:

  A STONE OF THE HEART

  “…towers above the mystery category as AN ELOQUENT, COMPELLING NOVEL…a tragic drama involving many characters, each so skillfully realized that one virtually sees and hears them in this extraordinary novel…”

  – PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

  “…A MASTERFULLY CRAFTED WORK of plot, atmosphere and especially characterization…Minogue, thoughtful, clear-eyed and perhaps too sensitive…is a full-blooded character built for the long haul of a series…”

  – MACLEAN’S

  UNHOLY GROUND

  “RIVETING…The suspense builds to barely bearable intensity…crackles with pungent Irish idiom and its vignettes of the country’s everyday life.”

  – TORONTO STAR

  “Excellent Sergeant Matt Minogue…MARVELLOUS DIALOGUE, as nearly surreal as a Magritte postcard the sergeant likes, and a twisting treacherous tale.”

  – SUNDAY TIMES

  KADDISH IN DUBLIN

  “MATT MINOGUE, THE MAGNETIC CENTRE OF THIS SUPERB SERIES…and Brady’s tone of battered lyricism are the music which keep drawing us back to this haunting series…” – NEW YORK TIMES

  “Culchie Colombo with a liberal and urbane heart…like all the best detective stories it casts its net widely over its setting…[Minogue is] a character who should run and run.” – IRISH TIMES

  ALL SOULS

  As lyrical and elegantly styled as the last three…A FIRST-RATE STORY WITH MARVELLOUS CHARACTERS… Another masterful tale from a superior author.”

  – GLOBE AND MAIL

  “Nothing gets in the way of pace, narrative thrust or intricate story-telling.” – IRISH TIMES

  “A KNOCKOUT.” – KIRKUS REVIEWS

  THE GOOD LIFE

  “BRILLIANT CRAFTSMANSHIP.” – LIBRARY JOURNAL

  “Brady’s dead-on ear for dialogue and his knack for creating instantly engaging characters keep the pages flipping…one line of prose leads inexorably, compulsively to the next…” – QUILL & QUIRE

  “Brady, like Chandler, has a poet’s eye for place…[he] is emerging as ONE OF THE SUPREME STORYTELLERS OF CANADIAN CRIME FICTION.”

  – GLOBE AND MAIL

  A Carra King

  A MATT MINOGUE MYSTERY

  JOHN

  BRADY

  A Carra King

  A MATT MINOGUE MYSTERY

  McArthur & Company

  Toronto

  First published in Canada in 2000 by

  McArthur & Company

  322 King Street West, Suite 402

  Toronto, ON M5V 1J2

  Copyright © 2000 John Brady

  All rights reserved.

  The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise stored in a retrieval system, without the expressed written consent of the publisher, is an infringement of the copyright law.

  National Library of Canada Cataloguing in Publication Data

  Brady, John, 1955-

  A carra king

  A Matt Minogue mystery

  ISBN 1-55278-164-X (bound) ISBN 1-55278-204-2 (pbk)

  1.Title.

  PS8553.R245C37 2001 C813’.54 C00-931453-9

  PR9199.3.B72C37 2001

  eISBN 978-1-77087-099-4

  Design & Composition: Mad Dog Design Connection Inc.

  Cover & F/X: Mad Dog Design Connection Inc.

  Cover Photo: Shirley Pintea

  The publisher would like to acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) for our publishing activities. The publisher further wishes to acknowledge the financial support of the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.

  For Hanna, Julia and Michael,

  and for Chris and Mary Brady.

  Contents

  FOREWORD

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  FOREWORD

  Everyone is born a king… and most die in exile.

  – OSCAR WILDE

  Excerpt from a report delivered by the Hon. James Black and Mr. Trevor Dewdney to the Committee on Quaker Relief to Rural Districts in the Western Counties of Ireland delivered in London, 1849.

  . . . Indeed it seemed scarcely credible that in the town-land of Cahergeall, where we had witnessed the greatest calamities amongst the tenant farmers and their families, we found there neither bitterness nor animosity.

  Most heartening to us was to see how religious worship had not wavered. Indeed there seems to have been a revival in devotions which have formerly fallen into obscurity and disuse over the centuries. Our stay was but days after the celebration of a notable event of which we had heard no mention of formerly in our travels before the Famine. The crowning of the Carra King, culminating in a pilgrimage and celebrations on a nearby hillside, is an event of great significance in the locality, as it marks the beginning of the growing season. Though not an event of note in the locality in at least a lifetime, it has been revived this last year, doubtless due to a need amongst the people to celebrate their delivery from the Famine.

  An unmarried man, or an eligible bachelor as the expression is used here, is chosen to carry a stone bearing what local folklore holds to be the image of Crom Dubh, an ancient king converted by St. Columbkille to Christianity. The Carra King stone, weighing in excess of a hundredweight, is held on the back by leather straps and carried to the hilltop where it is blessed and revered. This task is made even more onerous by a regimen of fasting and sleeping outdoors on the heather, practices reminiscent of the ascetic traditions of monastic life long ago, and indicative of a link with the voluntary privations in tests of manhood we read of in folklore, all preparatory to undertaking a “geis,” or a mighty test to establish honour in ancient Irish society.

  For a night and a day, people gather on the bare hillside and in the vicinity to pray for a harvest and the prospect of a short winter with families well provisioned. As with the other festivals held in the country, this is also the occasion for other transactions and socializing, with news being exchanged, marriages discussed and, as can be expected amongst a people known for their love of music and storytelling, dancing and fair atmosphere.

  Dr. Power, a physician, who has practised in the locality for twenty years, related to us pieces of local lore which suggested that the Carra King may have some of its origins in barbaric practices which had persisted after the arrival of Christianity in the time of Patrick and Columbkille. The original king, Dr. Power surmised, may have been party to tyranny and disputes of succession which eventuated in a situation Dr. Power suggested was not unlike the well-known tragic figure in the Bard’s “Danish” play . . .

  ONE

  The driver braked late for the lights and the Fiat began to slide. Larry Smith cursed and eased off the pedal. What the hell was he doing with this law-abiding routine, stopping for an amber traffic light on a Sunday morning? He shifted into f
irst before the car came to a stop halfway across the white line and he groped under the seat for the pistol. It hadn’t shifted.

  A Toyota van turned onto Strand Road ahead. Some fella delivering the Sunday papers? He looked across the bay. The tide north of Dublin was out. Lambay Island like a slab sitting on the grey, flat water of the Irish Sea. Frigid-looking, the colour of water out of the washer, or an old, battered saucepan. There was piles more rain on the way too. What a poxy start to the day.

  Even the golf clubhouse looked like a dump. It’d been twenty years since Zipper Brophy and his brothers had destroyed that clubhouse. There’d been two days of questioning, he remembered, and a hammering from head cases in the Special Branch. All because a lot of Guards were members. Zipper was dead three years now. It was pure heroin, one of the first loads to hit town. Zipper’d always been careless. It was April 1st too, of all days, and they found him in the toilet out at the Jolly Rover, that dump that had burned down in Finglas last year. Plainclothes Guards all over at the funeral too, trying to mix in. They’d almost caused a scrap with Zipper’s brother outside the church.

  He looked in the rear-view mirror again. The early mass in Sutton was started already. He shifted in his seat to get a better look at the sea. He thought of the last holiday he’d had with Yvonne. It’d been like a honeymoon all over again in Portugal.

  He yawned until the tear almost broke away from his eye. He’d been shaky enough getting up. He drew the pistol out from under the seat and laid it in his lap. Nice weight to it, balancing there, and the little knob under the trigger-guard. He’d been on the move for a month now, after he’d heard the rumours. Moving around every night had left him restless, washed-out. You couldn’t really get a night’s sleep like this. He couldn’t even use the cell phone to talk to Yvonne. Someone had heard the law could get in on the new ones even. Well how was that anyway, wasn’t it an infringement on a person’s basic rights and all that?

  He leaned over the wheel and stared at the red light. He should give up on the Fiat really. The blind spots were making him jittery. Cheaper to fix the smashed wing mirrors, sure, but it was burning a bit of oil now. He swore.

  A screech and a flicker in the side mirror made him drop his hand on the pistol. He looked out the passenger window. A seagull drifted down onto the footpath. That’s all it was? He looked at the twisted edges on the mirror frame. Both of them smashed in the one night a fortnight ago. Christ, if he got his hands on the little bastards. His back was tightening up on him already. He leaned over the wheel again but it didn’t help. He let out the clutch a little, let the Fiat roll into the junction.

  That van ahead was taking its time. Well what if he were to just drop it all and get into Australia or someplace? On his own, and then send for Yvonne after he was set up right — and on the QT of course. Shouldn’t be that hard. A car, a Renault, was cruising up to the lights now. There was only the driver. He looked up at the red light again. Christ, were they broken or what? The road ahead looked suddenly huge and empty. He couldn’t be sitting here in the middle of nowhere on a lousy, rainy Sunday morning. He let in the clutch.

  The banging came steadily from the back. He jammed the accelerator to the floor. The Renault had come through the junction. The back doors of the van were opening. Spots appeared on the panel of the passenger door, and a burning smell stung in his nose. He banged the pistol on the ashtray as he went to find second gear. Glass showered across the seat at him. He kept the wheel turning. The growl and burr of the impacts didn’t seem to be so loud now. The glove compartment shattered a split second before the windscreen went white. He banged at the glass with the end of the pistol but it wouldn’t give.

  The first shot hit him in the shoulder, knocked him hard against the door. The steering wheel went nuts and then locked as the Fiat mounted the footpath, slid along the seawall and stalled. He heard himself shouting. The spots on the steering wheel were blood, he knew. He wondered when he’d begin to feel his arm, why he wasn’t panicking.

  He rolled out onto the footpath. The glass grinding into his elbows didn’t register with him. He thought of the rocks under the seawall, if he could get over there.

  “Who are yous?”

  The Fiat twitched with more impacts.

  “We’ll work this out . . .!”

  Seaweed, he smelled; rubber, oil, sewage.

  “Give me a chance to talk . . .!”

  He waited. Still nothing.

  “Just tell me what you’re after . . .!” It wasn’t a shout now, a screech that ripped at his throat. “. . . Just let me fucking talk!”

  The buzzer from the open door was driving him around the twist.

  “Whatever it is . . .! Come on . . .! Who are you?”

  There were more shots from the front now. It was a steady pattern now, like those drum rolls he used to do in that band the social workers organized for them back when they were in fifth class, that stupid community band. Something stung as it flew into his cheek. He pressed his face to the panel by the wheel. The bullets slamming into bodywork resonated through his cheekbone.

  “Jesus,” Larry Smith whispered. “Yvonne.”

  Running feet were zigzagging his way. They weren’t stopping, slowing down even. The panic broke over him then. He shoved the pistol around the side of the bumper, fired twice, ducked back.

  Larry Smith was turning to see if others had come up behind him when a bullet shattered the base of his skull. It was a firearm of similar calibre if not the identical weapon, the Garda press release stated two days later, that was also used to blow parts of Larry Smith’s head across Strand Road. The post-mortem report contained three further sentences, which were to be much remarked upon in the Murder Squad. They concerned what appeared to be the marks of a kick to the face delivered, it seemed, prior to the coup de grâce.

  “Lads,” said APF Colm Brennan. He waited until they looked over at him. At least they’d see the uniform and cop on that he was Airport Police. “Lads? Come on now, for the love of God. This is Dublin Airport now, not a bloody rave-up. Yous can’t be blocking the way here.”

  There were five of them now. Brennan looked around at the faces of these die-hard fans of Public Works. Nobody had actually complained. The trouble was that the big fella, the dopey-looking one with the four hundred studs in his ears, had started drinking out of something from inside his jacket. He could be fifteen or he could be twenty, couldn’t be sure. But he was the one to watch. He might lose the head handy enough, that one.

  “Well, turn it down at least. Do you hear me?”

  The big fella threw his hair back, began nodding to the beat.

  “. . . teenage babies die at night . . .”

  Brennan thought, God, if he heard that stupid song one more time. Where were those fellas living with their depressing frigging “tunes”? Hadn’t they heard there were jobs out there, the Celtic Tiger going around roaring money now? He waited for the big fella to look over. Not a chance, no. And the others were ignoring him too. The young one with the tights for pants and the yellow hair and the thing in her nose was swaying and dancing and grinning. A taxi pulled away from the drop-off area by the terminal doors. The driver beeped as he passed. The big fella waved and raised his fist.

  “Yeaaaahhhhh!”

  Brennan clutched the walkie-talkie tighter behind his back and glanced over at the video camera set high in the wall. The big fella turned away. He was taking another swig out of the bottle.

  Enough was enough. Brennan stepped over.

  “Look,” he said. “That’s the limit.”

  The big fella dropped the bottle inside his jacket. He stared at some point on Brennan’s chest.

  “What’s A, P, F? I mean, you’re not a real cop, are you?”

  “Airport Police, and yeah, I am a real policeman. Now turn that thing down, get your gear and move on.”

  “— The F, though. There — APF. F stands for something. Right?”

  Brennan stared at him.

  �
��Airport Police and Fire Service. Take your mates too.”

  “So it’s like fires too, you have to put out fires, right? Like, big fires?”

  Brennan stared into the bloodshot eyes. He couldn’t tell if it was just the slagging or something else on the way.

  “Okay,” he said. “That’s it. Out of here. It’s over, let’s go.”

  “Well, wait a minute here.” The big fella wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I’ve got me rights haven’t I? No one’s hassled here, are they? All we’re doing is seeing the band off.”

  He lit a cigarette. His eyes stayed steady on Brennan’s. A guitar riff howled behind him. The big fella started to snigger and turned away, shaking with laughter. Brennan looked from face to face, down at the ghetto blaster, the bags, the rucksacks. Badges everywhere, paint, beads, studs. And they thought Public Works was still the local lads, their pals. Gobshites. They didn’t even cop on that Public Works had their own frigging jet at the far end of the airport. That they were going off to do a video somewhere. That worldwide success didn’t begin with the bloody band climbing out of taxis and buses like ordinary Joe Soaps and pushing trolleys up to the bloody check-in. He wished he could tell them.

  “All right, then,” Brennan muttered. “Don’t say I didn’t tell you.”

  A minibus with tinted windows had stopped near the doors.

  “Look,” the big lug called out. “It’s the lads!”

  Brennan knew that he’d left it too late. He made it in front of the girl. The others moved around him. He thumbed to transmit, hoped to God Fogarty or someone had been keeping an eye on things. Not a bloody Guard in sight. The girl got by him. There were hands pawing the minibus. The big fella had his face plastered up to a side window on the van. Fogarty, the supervisor, answered on the radio.

  “They’re mobbing a van here,” Brennan said. “We need to get people out.”

  He began shoving the teenagers away.

  “Leave the van alone!” he shouted. “That couldn’t be them!”

  The girl with the face full of hardware shrieked the name of the lead guitarist. Brennan squinted in the window himself. Could it be someone from the band? The tint was so bloody dark.