I sank back into my funk. Twenty dire minutes later, I finished the drink and, if anything, it had deepened my despair. Asked myself if it was too late to get back on my Beckett or cut my literary loss, head stateside. On the way to the door, the girl blocked my path. And her looks? She could be a ringer for Meadow, Tony Soprano's daughter and, in my fragmented book, that was solid. She asked,

  "Are you some kind of mature student?"

  Mature was imbued with a weight of scorn.

  I tried for Jack's "wipe the floor" with her but I had nothing. Her face, just truly lovely, had unnerved me. She stood there for a moment assessing me.

  Man, there are few analyses like that of an Irishwoman. It's not even so much what you are as

  "what they might make of you."

  Scary shit.

  She asked,

  "If I marry you will I get a green card?"

  I spluttered,

  "What the . . ."

  She gave a radiant smile, said,

  "But let's play by the rules. Meet me here at eight tomorrow and buy me dinner."

  I managed,

  "Like a date?"

  She was turning on her heel, then,

  "Well, it's hardly like a . . . tragedy."

  A shopping mall in Nairobi was seized by terrorists brandishing automatic weapons. They screamed at anyone who was a Muslim to leave. A young non-Muslim, an Englishman, managed a few nervous words of Arabic and was released. They then began to systematically murder the remainder. At least fifty people were killed.

  My dinner date with Aine (it was, she said, Irish for Ann) went well. After I asked her to my apartment for a coffee, she said,

  "You just want a fuck."

  Good Lord!

  Then she added,

  "Let's see if you're worth screwing."

  I thought her use of the most basic obscenity was a test and, heavens to Betsy, it certainly was testing, but I felt I could hang in there. Bottom line being that she kept me off balance and that in itself was a rush. She said to me,

  "If a man says no to a woman, she wants to die. If a woman says no to a man, he wants to kill."

  I told her a partial truth, said,

  "That's very provocative."

  And got that Irish look, mix of amusement and derision, as she answered,

  "But provocative to whom?"

  Van Veeteren assumed that in this simple way he was obtaining permission to proceed from a higher authority and wondered in passing if this might be one of the motives for all religious activities: the need to pass responsibility on to someone else.

  (Håkan Nesser, The Strangler's Honeymoon)

  I was attempting to explain to Aine why I'd started writing a book on Jack Taylor, began with,

  "The guy saved my ass."

  She was skeptical, said,

  "He stopped a street fight! It hardly merits you devoting your life to him."

  As I've said, Aine was hot but, truth to tell, exasperating. I continued,

  "One book is hardly devotion."

  She fixed on me that intense no-prisoners Irish gaze,

  "You got some high-flying scholarship to study Samuel Beckett and you're jeopardizing that to write about a worn-out alky nobody?"

  I tried to explain that mystery and Ireland would be a surefire combination in the States. Then I could, having sold film rights, return to Beckett at my leisure. She was raging.

  "Are you three kinds of eejit! A book about a broken-down Kojak in the west of Ireland is going to fly?"

  I said, rattled,

  "I know about books."

  She rolled her eyes, said,

  "And sweet fuck-all about the real world."

  A single entry in Jack Taylor's journal/notes for all of September 2013:

  "Cuir fidh se anois a chuid gaoither anois"

  (Now it shall please his conscience now).

  Jack's TV viewing had once been a learning curve all of itself. He asserted that American television was the new literature, that the finest writing was contained in the scripts of

  Breaking Bad

  Game of Thrones

  Low Winter Sun

  reaching back to The Sopranos and excelling onward. But like the darker turn in his psyche, he was now enthralled by

  Hardcore Pawn

  A pawnshop set in the middle of Detroit's 8 Mile, it was Jerry Springer meets American Horror Story.

  Pawnshops, he said,

  "Were the new Church of Ultimate Despair."

  Kennels for the Hound of Heaven.

  A linguistics expert has predicted that that the next generation of young Irish people will speak with American accents.

  I was treating Aine to dinner in Fat Freddy's in Quay Street. They do a seriously good chili. Aine was having coq au vin, smiling as she said it to me,

  "Irish people can never order that with a straight face."

  We'd just started a carafe of the house wine when I excused myself to answer my cell. Took the call outside on the street amid a riot of hen parties and young people celebrating exam results. The call was from my former tutor in Dublin, who, no frills, asked,

  "The fuck are you playing at?"

  Meaning, my abandonment of my tenure at Trinity as part of my scholarship.

  I lied, said,

  "Just taking time out to savor the country."

  Pause, then,

  "Savor fast and get your arse back here, you don't want to lose your place."

  Lots of replies to this but I went with brown-nosing,

  "Yes, sir, I'll be back in a few weeks."

  Buying time if not affection.

  When I returned to the table, a man was sitting in my chair, leaning across the table, apparently engrossed in conversation. I went,

  "What the hell . . . ?"

  The man stood up, mega smile, hand out, said,

  "Boru, forgive me. I was just keeping your lovely lady company."

  Something in the way he said "lovely" leaked a creepy familiarity over the word and I realized who he was:

  The professor, de Burgo.

  As I put this in some kind of skewed perspective, he rushed,

  "I spotted you earlier and just wanted to pop over, ask if there was a chance you'd guest-lecture for my department."

  He then literally ushered me into my chair, handed me a business card, said,

  "But let me not spoil your evening. Give me a bell when you get a chance and, truly, we'd be delighted to have you on board."

  And he was gone.

  He looked old, like a stranger. He was someone else, someone whom he could easily hate.

  (Tom Pitts, Piggyback)

  Jack seemed to get his rocks off on subtly putting me down.

  Well, maybe not so subtly.

  He'd been telling me of the golden age of TV, when he was a young man, said,

  "Fuck, we had Barney Miller and the magnificent Rockford Files."

  I admitted that, no, I didn't know those shows. He said,

  "And you'll look back on what? The Kardashians!"

  I went the wrong tack, tried,

  "I don't really watch a lot of television"

  And he was off.

  Like this,

  "Course not, you're too freaking academic to slum, you probably have wet dreams about Kurosawa and Werner Herzog."

  Jesus!

  I said,

  "That is reverse elitism."

  He laughed out loud, said,

  "Bet you're one of those pricks who say, "I don't read fiction," then sneak into the toilet with the National Enquirer.

  The Irish people were going to the polls, a referendum on two points:

  (a) To keep or abolish the senate.

  (b) To set up a new court of appeals.

  A fast track for cases in reality.

  Jack was shucking into his all-weather Garda coat. I asked,

  "You have to be somewhere?"

  He stared at me, said,

  "I'm going to vote."

  I was astounded, said,

  "You . . . you vote?"

  And he looked as if he might deck me, asked,

  "You think alkies don't have rights, that it?"

  In exasperation, I said,

  "There's no talking to you."

  "No, you mean there's no lecturing me!"

  A day later I was having a drink with Aine. We were in Hosty's, early in the evening, and a nice air of quiet pervaded. I'd nearly perfected the pronunciation of her name, had it as close to

  "Yawn-ah"

  Without the "y," obviously.

  We were doing well, she was telling me about a beauty course she was close to finishing. Then, she hoped to open a nail salon. I asked,

  "There's money in nails?"

  And got the look.

  The door behind me banged open but I didn't turn around. Then a hand grabbed my collar, hauled me off the stool. I crashed to the floor, my pint spilling over a new white shirt I was sporting. Jack stood over me, his fists balled, spit flying from his mouth, he rasped,

  "You tout, you piece of treacherous shit, you ratted me out to the Guards . . ."

  He had to pause for breath, some control, then,

  "And to Clancy, fucking Clancy of all people!"

  Aine was trying to grab Jack, pull him back, but he effortlessly shrugged her away, said,

  "I thought we had some kind of friendship! If you were anybody else, I'd kick your fucking head in."

  Aine shouted,

  "Leave him alone. I'll call the Guards!"

  He turned to her and the manic rage seemed to ebb. He said,

  "Jesus, the Guards! You two deserve each other."

  He looked down at me, said,

  "You sorry excuse for a man."

  And then threw some notes onto the counter, said to the stunned barman,

  "Buy these two beauts a drink, something yellow,

  And weak as piss."

  I would prefer to be in a coma and just be woken up and wheeled out onstage and play and then put back in my own little world.

  (Kurt Cobain)

  It was Aine who declared,

  "OK, if you're going to do a book on that . . ."

  She faltered,

  "Asshole,"

  Then,

  "You're going to have to be the scholar we keep hearing you are."

  I wasn't sure where this was going, said,

  "Not sure where this is going."

  She stifled her impatience, explained,

  "Sources . . . research, talk to the people who know/knew him."

  Made sense.

  Within a few days I had a list.

  Like this,

  Assorted barpersons.

  A woman named Ann Henderson, supposedly the one and only great love of his life. Of course, as used in Taylorland, the affair had ended badly with Ann marrying another Guard, an archenemy of Jack. Indeed, it was hard to find people who weren't enemies of his, arch or otherwise.

  Cathy and Jeff, the parents of the Down syndrome child whose death was widely attributed to Jack's negligence.

  Ban Garda Ridge, a sometime accomplice, confidante, and conspirator of Jack's.

  Father Malachy. A close friend of Jack's late mother and someone who'd known Jack for over twenty years. I was hoping he'd shed some light on Jack's hard-on for the Church. In light of the recent clerical scandals, maybe hard-on was a poor choice of noun.

  A solicitor who'd haphazardly dealt with Jack's numerous escapades with the Guards.

  There was a Romanian, Caz, whose name featured often but he'd apparently been deported in one of the government sweeps.

  The Tinkers were among the few who held Jack in some sort of ethnic regard.

  Father Malachy was the parish priest at St. Patrick's, the church of note for Bohermore. I had called ahead and, on arrival, was met by a nun. She was so old that she was practically bent in two. I wasn't sure if I should acknowledge her physique and stoop to her level. Jack would have said we'd bent down enough for the Church. She raised a feeble arm, pointed said,

  "The Father is in the sacristy."

  I tried,

  "I don't wish to disturb him."

  In a surprisingly terse tone, she snapped,

  "Ary, he's been disturbed for years."

  Then declared,

  "You're a Yank!"

  "Um . . . yes."

  "I have a sister in San Francisco, with the Sisters of the Pure of Heart."

  Wow, so many ways to play with that line. But she asked,

  "Did you bring something?"

  . . . Just an attitude . . .

  I said,

  "No, should I have?"

  "And they say Yanks are flaithiúil (generous)."

  I headed down the aisle and she fired,

  "You're already on the wrong foot."

  Every day is a gift. . . . but does it have to be a pair of socks?

  (Tony Soprano)

  Father Malachy was almost invisible behind a cloud. The effect was startling, as if a Stephen King fog or mist had enshrouded him. Then the stale fetid smell of nicotine hit like a hammer. He was in his late fifties, with a face mottled by rosacea, broken veins, and what I guess can only be described as lumps. He was dressed in clerical black, dandruff like a shroud on his shoulders. And I have to be mistaken, but the magazine he wiped off the cluttered desk seemed a lot like the National Enquirer.

  Surely not?

  He peered at me, rheumy-like, and, with not one hint of compassion, he snapped,

  "What'd you want?"

  I said,

  "I'm Boru Kennedy and wonder if I might have a . . ."

  He barked,

  "What the shite kind of name is that? Are ya a Yank?"

  I'd seen The Quiet Man and Darby O'Gill and the Little People, but any Hollywood image of the jovial Irish priest bore no relation to this ogre. Luckily, I had been cautioned to bring a bottle. To, as Aine suggested, "wet his whistle."

  Not sure why I told the nun I had nothing but Jack had advised me once . . . Lie always to the clergy, it is their stock-in-trade.

  I handed over the bottle.

  Jameson, of course.

  I was a dude who learned.

  If he was grateful, he gave no sign. He growled,

  "I've a cousin in the Bronx. He works for the Sanitation Department."

  Then he laughed,

  "The bollix is down the toilet."

  Pause, another cig, then,

  "What do you want?"

  I took a deep breath, lied,

  "I'm doing a profile of . . . um . . . colorful Galway personalities and I wonder if you might, please, have some thoughts on the ex-policeman Jack Taylor?"

  I waited for an explosion, a torrent of abuse, but a sly grin danced along his lips, he asked,

  "How much are you paying?"

  Of course.

  In my time in Ireland, I'd learned a few moves for dealing with the locals:

  (1) Never . . . ever, pump yourself up.

  (2) Adopt a nigh manic love of hurling. You didn't have to actually learn the game, just mutter "Ah, will we ever see the likes of D.J. Carey again?"

  (3) Make almost undetected snide comments on nonnationals, sliding in mention of the Holy Grail, i.e. medical cards.

  (4) Constantly refer to the weather as simply fierce.

  (5) Buy the first round but especially the last.

  (6) Rile a priest to get him going.

  I went with number 6, said,

  "They say Jack saved your life."

  Phew!

  Fireworks.

  He was on his feet, cigarette smoke nigh blinding him, spittle leaking from his mouth. He shouted,

  "That whore's ghost of a bollix! He killed a child and don't even get me started on how he drove his saint of a mother into an early grave."

  He blessed himself, adding,

  "May she rest in the arms of Jesus, the Bed of Heaven to her."

  Lest he launch into a full-blown rosary, I tried,

  "I was told the child's death was an accident."

  He made his hmph sound, underwrit with indignation, said,

  "Ask her parents, yeah, ask them if it was an accident."

  He was eyeing the bottle, could only be moments before he climbed in and that was an event I wished to bear witness to. But he changed tack, said,

  "Our new pope, supposedly he's embracing the simple life. No Gucci slippers for him."

  He fumed on that a bit, then conceded,

  "Least he sacked that bishop who just built a thirty-onemillion place."

  Threw his arms out to embrace his run of his home, said,

  "And they expect me to live on the charity of the parish! You know how much they put in the basket at Mass last Sunday?"

  I was guessing, not a lot.

  "Twenty-four euros, two buttons, and a scratch card."

  The urge to ask if he won. On the card.

  I stood up to take my leave, said, offering my hand,

  "Thank you so much for your time."

  But he was still in hate-Taylor mode, didn't quite know how to turn it off. He asked,

  "You heard about him and the nun?"

  Sounded like the title of a very crude joke. I tried,

  "I do know he's close to Sister Marie."

  He shot me a look of contemptible pity, spat,

  "Not that wannabe Mother Teresa. Years ago he was working on a case involving a murdered priest and an old frail nun had been working with the poor murdered fellah. Taylor said to her . . ."

  Pause.

  "I hope you burn in hell."

  I had an ace, played,

  "Wasn't that the time Jack saved you from serious child abuse allegations?"

  We were done.

  On his feet, he snarled,

  "Get out of my office . . . ya . . ."

  He searched for the most withering insult and as I reached the door, he trumpeted,

  "Yah Protestant."

  That evening I had dinner with Aine and related the encounter with the priest. She said,

  "There was a time, you know, priests ruled the roost here."

  I thought how far they'd tumbled, said,

  "Seems like they're reduced to scraping the bottom of the Irish barrel."

 

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