A Kind of Drowning, page 9
“…In Roscarrig,” said Crowe, “That’s a confirmation, so. What else?”
Harris cleared his throat, “His move hasn’t disrupted his business, still plenty of drugs coming in and making their way onto the street. But – pay a-fucking-ttention, Podge, there’s a lot of radio silence around his name, which would suggest to me, INTERPOL are working with our lads in the GNDU and the DPP. His missues fucked off to Spain last year and we suspect she’s the initial point of contact and general logistics for the drug shipments. This is all pointing to a bust. You know how long these things take to put together, so stay the fuck away from this guy.”
“So I’ve been told. Then our boy, Teflon probably has a boat and a point of landing?” asked Crowe.
He coloured in a doodle of a boat as he listened to Harris shuffling papers.
“Yup,” replied Harris, “Now this gets interesting. Your big island, Inishcarrig, it’s for sale by private treaty. Ephraim Hunt – the legend of the confiscated portfolios, bids, tenders, and plans by NAMA. That hasn’t stopped this joker putting a bid in on this island,”
Crowe’s mind began to whirr,
“Major drug lord and a property developer in the same neck of the woods? Bet Teflon wouldn’t like Hunt pissing all over his patch. Would you have a recent photo of Teflon?”
“I can’t do that, Crowe, you know the rules. Though, I can suggest you go to the on-line Daily Star. Are you on your phone? Its dated three weeks ago. His two sprogs, Fionn and Setanta signed a major record deal. K-Pop shite. Our boy Teflon’s in the background. Far right in the photo. Have you found it?”
Crowe double-tapped the image to increase the magnification. No doubt about it.
“Gotta go, Harris, have to see a man about a dog. Thanks for your help,”
Crowe hung up before Harris could reply.
***
The Staffordshire bull terrier was ploughing along the sand with compact meaty strides. Crowe could hear it panting as it strained against its harness. The twilight gave its wet coat an added sheen, no doubt contented at being hurled on a daily basis into the surf at the lifeboat station. The man with the baseball cap pulled low matched the photo. Crowe was staring at Teflon D.
“Got a light, bud?” asked Crowe,
“Don’t smoke, pal. Sorry,” replied Teflon.
The Staffy squatted and defecated gloriously. Once it had finished, Teflon banked the sand up in careful nudges over the turds with his expensive looking runners. Five rings of fat supported Teflon’s skull. From what Crowe could see, the fat merged with the shoulders somewhere below the ears. One threaded eyebrow had three thin razored lines cut in. The eyes were blue, unblinking, reptilian. Teflon D was a mass of Hi Viz waterproof jacket with the collar turned up and black ADIDAS.
“The tide will wash it away,” he replied, judging Crowe’s expression. The beach was deserted anyway. Crowe jammed the cigarette in under his cap.
“That’s some island,” he said, nodding to Inishcarrig. The light was fading fast, turning the greens and ambers to a lifeless looking dun. The sea between churned darkly.
“Roman coins were found there,” said Teflon.
The dog was sitting on its hip on the sand. The tail thumped in thick swings,
“Quadrans with the face of Hadrian, two earthen jars found buried intact were full of them. They were excavated on the far side of the island,” said Teflon. He gave the leash a gentle whip, but the staffy was staying put. It jerked its head back and forth between Crowe and Teflon displaying jowly rows of fangs, wheezing like a bellows between intermittent growls.
“History buff?” asked Crowe.
Teflon cracked a smile,
“Amateur, bud. An amateur. Seems there was trade between here and Roman Britain. Then came the Vikings. Just past the tower there they found more coins, Viking silver, dated 995 to 998, CE.”
“CE?” asked Crowe.
“’Common Era’, they’re phasing out Anno Domini, bud. No more Jesus, it upsets the other faiths,”
“Not a bad idea,” said Crowe, “Are there still archaeological digs going on the island?” he continued.
“No, Not since the financial crash. Everything stopped, the archaeologists all packed up and left.”
“Romans, Vikings, Napoleon, any old smuggler’s caves? Looks like the perfect location for a bit of piracy and running a bit of contraband. You should do a YouTube talk, post it up,” said Crowe.
“Not my scene, sport. Leave all that social media malarkey to the next generation. Nice talking to you.”
Teflon made a clicking sound and the dog began to stir. Without warning it made a lunge towards Crowe, jaws snapping. Crowe stood his ground,
“Not very friendly is he?” he said.
Teflon wrangled the animal back with a grin,
“Hates coppers, but I reckon he’s homesick or hungry,”
“You’re not local then?” asked Crowe.
“Just passing through,” replied Teflon.
Crowe could sense that Teflon was taking him in. The eyes beneath the cap carefully scanned the worn shoes, the shapeless pants and tattered fleece jacket. He might have looked like a vagrant on a day out, but the dog wasn’t fooled.
“Same here,” said Crowe.
“Stay off the coffin nails,” said Teflon, “My Da was an eighty a day man. Killed him in his fifties. Cancer.”
“I’ll bear that in mind,” said Crowe.
Teflon had kept one hand out of sight, buried into the jacket’s pocket. Crowe wondered if it was the hand with the missing thumb. He debated following Teflon, weighed it up in his mind, but as they were the only souls on the beach it would look obvious. In the gathering evening light, Crowe waited until Teflon had left the beach.
He sparked up his cigarette.
Teflon was right, the tide had flowed in, each wave covering the dog shit.
The sea water lapped greedily around Crowe’s heels as he smoked and watched the receding figure. It wasn’t lost on him that if it hadn’t been for them, Crowe would have ended up tagged in the morgue as a suicide.
Teflon and his dog disappeared into shadows, mottled in pulses of sea spray. In the gathering night, the island felt like a magnet drawing everyone and everything toward it. It both anchored and repelled the town, like some silent, festering cancerous cell.
He finished his smoke and crushed the butt into the soaking sand and decided that tomorrow, he’d stop by and make a sympathy call.
16
Crowe couldn’t count how many times he had made the walk up a pathway to someone’s home to deliver the worst possible news. His gut twisted instinctively as he opened the old fashioned wrought iron gate to Thea’s home. More and more of his wrecked police nerve-endings were starting to reconnect and spark. The house was a renovated two-storey with a red brick façade. Everything apart from the gate looked spruce, modern, and well maintained. The windows shone in front of white New England shutters slanted closed, stifling any available sunlight. The driveway had an engine oil stain, framed by faded tyre tracks that reminded Crowe of a birthmark. This led via a shady passage to a gate into the back garden. A wall-mounted basketball hoop stood forlorn and limp on the corner of the house, the netting swaying in the sea breeze.
It was unseasonably warm. The sun burned through the sky and made Crowe sweat beneath his fleece as he rang the doorbell. Somehow it seemed the most silent house on the planet. The shuttered interiors inhabited by ghosts.
He gave the bell two more presses.
He heard the sound of a key turning and Grace Farrell stood staring at him. Her clothing was as uncoordinated and misshapen as his,
“I’ve come to pay my respects, Mrs Farrell,” said Crowe, “my deepest condolences on your loss,”
Grace’s skin was sere in the harsh sunlight. She had clearly abandoned make up. Her hair hung limp and unwashed. She was a woman barely forty now passing for seventy.
“Thank you,” she murmured, then gave a sudden shake, “I’m sorry, I don’t recognise you?”
“My name is John, I worked in the café with her, with Thea,”
Grace’s gaze suddenly bored into Crowe, starting with his unkempt pink hair, and working down taking in every inch of him. She showed a flicker of pity at the state of his shoes.
“Mr. Grumpy?”
“Yes. That was Thea’s name for me. She was an amazing, wonderful soul,”
“She talked about you a lot. Come in. I have a pot of tea on.”
“I won’t take too much of your time,” said Crowe.
“I’ve all the time in the world,” she said.
The hall was a shrine to Andrew Farrell, the footballer. Every inch of wall space was covered with him and older photographs of a man who must have been his father. Both sinewy warriors in shorts and football jerseys. A framed newspaper article showed the father and son holding a trophy and grinning broadly. As Crowe walked along the hall he glanced at more pictures of numerous golf outings, groups of men all red-eyed and shiny behind the glass.
There were no pictures of Thea.
Laminate timber flooring, scuffed by countless boots and shoes led to a huge bright kitchen. A stack of unwashed pots and pans sat on the draining board. The kitchen smelled of old grease and fried bacon,
“Please, sit down,” she said.
Crowe pulled a chair out; a smear of mud lay caked on the wooden seat. He eased himself down, avoiding as much of it as he could.
“How are you and your husband doing?” he asked, “Andrew isn’t it?”
The ceramic teapot was shaking as Grace poured,
“Oh you know, day-by-day, one step-at-a-time, the usual…”
The tea spilled over the rim of the mug,
“That’s perfect,” said Crowe pulling the mug toward him, “Thank you, Mrs Farrell,”
“You can call me Grace, no need to be formal, John,” she replied.
He sipped enough away to allow some milk. A small jug and a crystal sugar bowl were slid toward him across a table criss-crossed with dried-in cup rings. Grace had only one slipper on as she turned away from the table to put the pot on the counter. He piled in three heaped teaspoons and drank,
“Will you have one yourself?” he asked.
“I’ve had a bellyful of tea, thanks,” she said.
Crowe had learned over the years that silence worked best. Whether it was the interview room or visiting a heart-broken family, saying nothing, and letting the person talk to a uniform was cathartic.
Except he wasn’t in uniform.
He was almost at the end of the cup when Grace turned and looked back,
“I’ve never seen you before. Are you a blow-in?” she asked.
Crowe allowed a lop-sided smile,
“No. Just passing through. Derry Gallagher set me up for a few weeks. Which is why I’m here. I’d just like to say, before I move on, that Thea was a smashing kid,”
“She was. Yes. A gift,” replied Grace.
Crowe nodded in agreement and downed the dregs. Leaves filled his tongue and gums. But it was worth it. Grace shuffled over with the pot. More tea spilled, but Grace’s shaking had stopped,
“Yes, she was. Oh dear,” she breathed. She got up again and shuffled toward a unit over the kitchen, she came back with a packet of cigarettes,
“Andrew never liked me smoking. I quit fifteen years ago, but now, I don’t care,” she said.
“Allow me,” said Crowe.
He produced his lighter and his own pack. He offered her a light then lit up himself. Grace opened a side window bringing cool relief to the heat of the kitchen.
She continued, “Thank you. I did it for Thea, I wanted to be around as long as possible for her. We both knew that if she survived past thirty, it’d be a boon.”
She stopped and jerked her head toward the back garden as if she had heard something, an echo or memory of Thea maybe? In profile, Grace Farrell was still a handsome woman.
“We, well, Andrew didn’t want to go again. We were afraid we’d have another one. Andrew used to say he didn’t want to inflict another one on the community,”
“Inflict? That’s a bit harsh,” said Crowe.
“I could see his point. Maybe if we’d had one that was… healthy, whole, complete – God forgive me, Thea would have had someone to watch over her, look out for her,”
“Not Thea’s style,” said Crowe.
Grace smiled thinly, “No. Not Thea’s style. True. She was a fighter,”
Crowe followed Grace’s gaze. At the back of the garden was a fence, and beyond the fence, the dunes to the sea.
“Tough as nails. Took no prisoners, that girl. How did Andrew take it? How is he coping?” asked Crowe.
Grace exhaled a long plume of smoke.
“Oh, he’s busy, always busy, I’m married to a busy little bee – that’s what Thea called him, ‘our busy, busy bee.’ He’s pinning his hopes on a new venture, he thinks there’s going to be a big project for the town…”
Crowe remined silent. He swilled his tea as if divining the leaves swirling at the bottom.
“He works all the hours God gives him,” said Grace, “he was always a good provider, and working for yourself is always 24/7, but I think he never wanted to be here with Thea and me. He used to run to his parents place, even when Thea was young. They put a brave face on it, but they never accepted Thea. The father couldn’t bring himself to look at her. Sometimes he’d shout at her, and Andrew… Sorry,” her voice caught on a rising swell of emotion but rode it on a breath, “…Andrew would never face him down, stand up for her…”
“I’ve taken up enough of your time,” said Crowe. He started to rise, but Grace flapped an arm down.
“Sit. You’re not like the rest of this town. We are a small fishing community. Tight knit, conservative and Catholic. I know when you leave none of this will matter. The problem here is we were all born in Roscarrig and we went from the primary school to the secondary, communion to confirmation, twenty firsts and weddings, then births, communion and confirmations – where are you from, John, may I ask?”
“Clonmel, the family eventually settled in Dublin,” replied Crowe.
Grace nodded absently, “Everyone loved her, you see?, Thea. She was wilful, oh God, could be a wilful brat sometimes but pure, like?”
Crowe leaned a little forward, he wrapped his fingers around the cup. Grace took a long drag and continued,
“In some ways she was blessed. I wanted her to have a good life. I thought it would be a blessing that she’d never have children of her own. What sort of world would her children have with the climate crisis ‘n all? In fifty years or so, Roscarrig will be under water and gone. Gone like Avalon. And this variant flu everyone’s talking about? Another bloody virus. One after another? All we, no, all I wanted was for Thea to live out her life as full as possible… Her natural life. Not this. Fuck no, not this…”
Crowe put the empty cup down. He rose to leave, and Grace looked up,
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“Lookit, tell you what, I’ll give a hand over there,” he nodded.
He motioned to the pile of pots and pans. The sink was full of unwashed delph too. Grace looked lost in her thoughts; the cigarette tip glowed with her breaths. Crowe ran the hot water tap and filled the sink with hot water. He located steel wool under the sink unit and scrubbed the pots thoroughly working the suds into the caked-in food. He worked in silence with his back to her as he wiped down the counter top. He could hear her let out long sighs. One sounded like a moan,
“It’s not right. It doesn’t feel right, you know? It was a stupid row with Andrew. If I hadn’t lost my temper, she’d still be here. Poor Thea. We went to bed without looking in on her. We saw the light on under the door. Every single night we would look in and blow kisses, but we were exhausted…”
“Would it have been late?” asked Crowe.
“After midnight. Andrew was restless, he couldn’t settle. Went back downstairs to watch Netflix or something. I thought he’d looked in on her… He told me he had, but he’d had a few cans, his little nightcaps. Do you think she suffered? They say it’s a peaceful way to go,”
Crowe thought about all the bodies he had seen fished out of rivers, found on the shore, or removed from cars that had slipped accidentally off piers or deliberately driven into the water in a moment of despair. Nothing he ever saw behind the tape or in the morgue ever said ‘peaceful’.
“I’ve no idea,” he said.
The tears came now. In floods. Crowe looked at Grace Farrell as she folded over the table weeping. He stepped over and placed a hand on her shoulder gently,
“There we go, a little bit tidier,” he said.
“Thanks, John,” said Grace wiping her face with the heel of her hand.
Just as he reached the hall, he turned.
“Can I ask what the big project Andrew was going to be working on?” he asked.
“Andrew says the island is going to become a golf course or some sort of leisure resort – but you know small towns, rumour mills,” said Grace.
“Cities are worse, believe me,” said Crowe, “I’ll let myself out,”
Crowe stepped into the sunlight and pulled the door shut. He stared up at the sun in the clear azure skies. It glinted off a passing aircraft making it look like a slow motion meteorite tearing across the sky.
What sort of world will Cathal’s children have? He thought. Cathal was a constant dull ache in his heart. Crowe pondered if there was any hope of a reconciliation.
Crowe turned off the path and crossed the driveway to the side passage. He walked down it and came to a tall wooden gate. Like everything about the exterior, it was painted and well-maintained. Too high to peer over on his tiptoes he stepped back.
The over-revving of an engine made him turn. A white transit van pulled in and Andrew Farrell spotting Crowe, jumped out,
“What the hell are you doing?” he barked.
Crowe walked up, “Came to pay my respects,”
“What, by trying to get over my fence?”
Crowe could see Andrew Farrell had a zero to asshole setting that activated like a light switch.
“Chased a cat off your hardy perennials at the front, the dirty little bastard,” said Crowe easing past Farrell. He proffered a hand, “My condolences again for your loss. Thea was a…”
