Dark Dawn (2 page)

O’Neill put his notebook away and stood under the corrugated iron roof. He pulled smoke into his lungs, the nicotine peeling back the lack of sleep from the night before. Jack Ward arrived and picked his way across the rubble. Ward was fifty-six, stocky, and wore a black trenchcoat. He was a good boss and trusted his troops to get on with things. Ward spoke slowly and was quiet and watchful. He gave the impression he’d seen it all before, that nothing would surprise him. The DI was eighteen months away from retirement, one of the few senior CID officers who had stayed on after the Peace Process. It was the release of all the prisoners that sparked the mass exodus. Ward remembered standing in Musgrave Street canteen, watching the TV. Men walked out of prison. A quick pump of the fist before ducking into waiting cars. Ward knew half of them by name. They’d spent years murdering peelers. He’d spent his career trying to put them behind bars. Now
they
were out. All of them. In the corner of the room Jackie Robinson, a DC of ten years, puked in a bin. Tony Callaghan, one of the other DIs, summed it up rather eloquently.

‘Fuck this.’

Callaghan was gone within six months. It seemed like half the force had the same idea. Guys with fifteen, twenty years on them. All gone. Ward had stayed on though, holding his ground, keeping his counsel. Something in him couldn’t walk. At least not yet.

Six years on, standing next to O’Neill, he pulled a packet of B&H from his jacket and lit one. Ward looked at the ground by their feet.

‘Two fags? Christ. You’re really drinking this one in.’

Ward was relaxed with his troops. Occasionally he sounded like an old schoolteacher; everyone still ‘sir-ed’ him, out of respect more than anything. The two detectives stared at the scene. Their eyes moved over objects, holding them for a moment, committing them to memory. O’Neill looked at the rain, then up at the dark, threatening sky.

‘Reckon someone up there doesn’t like us, sir?’

Ward laughed quietly. ‘You only figuring that out now?’

Ward looked at the body in the grey tracksuit. He nodded, pointing his cigarette.

‘You see? That’s why I never go jogging.’

O’Neill smiled. Nothing came between a peeler and his attitude. He had learned that during his first week in CID. He glanced at the billboard where powerful up-lights illuminated a finished version of Laganview Apartments. The building was a glistening silver cube, all glass and mirrors.

‘I don’t know, sir. I could see you in one of these yuppie flats.’

Ward glanced sideways. ‘On my salary, son? I wouldn’t believe everything you heard in Police College.’

It had rained all morning and looked like it was on for the day. O’Neill imagined the waters rising over Belfast. A second Great Flood. Christ knew, the place could do with it.

‘Take your time here,’ Ward announced. ‘I’m putting you up front on this one.’

O’Neill swallowed hard. He’d worked Suspicious Death before but only in a support role, never as Principal Investigator. PI meant calling the shots. Bodies were a big deal, even in Northern Ireland. There would be SOCOs, Forensics, the pathologist, not to mention the press and top brass, all breathing down his neck. When a body turned up, people wanted to know.

On the drive from Musgrave Street Ward had thought through his options before deciding to give O’Neill the case. O’Neill had been an Acting Sergeant for nine months and it would be his first major case as PI. It was a big call. Bob Townsend, the regular DS, was on secondment and due back next month. The Review Boards were coming up and Ward knew the Chief Inspector, Charles Wilson, wanted O’Neill out of CID and back in uniform. If the truth be told, Wilson wanted O’Neill gone altogether. Uniform would do though, for the time being. Wilson didn’t like O’Neill. As a DC he’d made the fatal mistake of disagreeing with the Chief Inspector in front of people. It was two years ago and something pretty minor, but the Chief Inspector didn’t forget. He reckoned O’Neill wasn’t cut out for CID. He was wrong – Ward knew it. He’d watched O’Neill for three years. Sure, he was a bit rough round the edges and he made mistakes, but once he bit on to something, he didn’t let go. O’Neill was the real thing. He was just enough of a stubborn arsehole to be a really good detective.

None of that mattered though. Not to Wilson. The Review Boards were next month and the Chief Inspector would make his move there. Being sent back to uniform would mark O’Neill out. He’d be damaged goods. Everyone would know it. His only hope was to have a big case under his belt, and they didn’t come much bigger than a murder. If O’Neill could wrap Laganview up before the Review Boards, Wilson wouldn’t be able to touch him.

The Chief Inspector was a new breed. Twenty-first-century police. A company man. An accountant. Happier in meetings, reading reports, compiling budgets. Flying off across the water to drink cups of coffee with other number-crunchers from the Met, Greater Manchester Police, Lothian and Borders. Don’t ask him to solve a crime though. The last place you wanted Wilson was on a job, knocking on a door, interviewing a suspect.

Ward had watched over the last ten years as a slew of Wilsons came in and slowly took over the force. He knew one thing: they might wear a uniform, but they weren’t peelers. They thought crime could be solved with spreadsheets and graphs, with statistics and pie charts. And when they opened their mouths they sounded more like politicians than cops. They played the angles and made the right friends. They were never happier than when they were getting their mugs on TV. He’d seen a generation of Wilsons rise up the rank – at the same time as he was passed over.

‘Next time, Jack. There’s always next time.’

It was bullshit and Ward knew it. He was too old. His face didn’t fit. He didn’t speak the lingo. He would retire next year anyway, leave the force to Wilson and the rest of the bean-counters.

There was still O’Neill though. O’Neill was a peeler. A real peeler. On the drive over to Laganview, Ward had come up with an idea. What if he left O’Neill behind him. Make him the stone in Wilson’s shoe. Always there. Niggling away. Ward had smiled at the thought. He knew it wasn’t just about Wilson though. It wasn’t just some personal vendetta. It was bigger than that. The North needed peelers like O’Neill. Now more than ever. It needed guys to get out there, to get involved, to get their hands dirty. Hiding in meetings, ducking behind spreadsheets . . . what did that ever get done?

***

Standing beside Ward, O’Neill studied the area round the body. The SOCOs were on their way with a tent.
Protect the integrity of the scene.
He remembered his Locard from Police College: the first rule of forensic science, every contact leaves a trace. O’Neill looked at the rain. Most of the forensics would have washed into the river and be halfway to Scotland by now. Maybe the rules didn’t apply in Belfast.

O’Neill still hadn’t gone near the body. When the SOCOs arrived they’d begin from the perimeter and work their way in, in everdecreasing circles. They’d go slowly, patiently, following the golden rule which says there may be only one crime scene, but there are many ways to fuck it up.

The body was an IC1 male. Late teens, pale and skinny, with hollow cheeks and a shaved head. The most important question was, who was he? Ninety per cent of homicides were committed by someone who knew the victim. A neighbour, a friend, a relative. That was right. In a detective’s litany of cynical thoughts, the nearest and dearest were never excluded from the list. Random attacks? Stranger danger? Ward was right. People watched too much TV. Start with his mates, call them killers, see who blinks. Find out who the victim was, you were halfway to finding out who killed him.

The kid’s grey tracksuit was wet through. A 3-foot pool of red spread out from his head, mixing with a puddle of rainwater. They would wait for the pathologist, but it looked like a fatal head wound that finally turned the lights out.

O’Neill ran his eyes the length of the body. The legs were wrong. Twisted out of shape, like an Action Man tossed away by a child. Was he a jumper? O’Neill looked at the roof of the apartment block, 30 feet away. Not unless he was Jesse Owens.

No. This thing had ‘punishment beating’ written all over it. Sure, they’d been a bit over-enthusiastic with the bats, but it was a punishment beating nonetheless.

O’Neill rolled his eyes. Punishment beatings were a Grade-A nightmare. They were a paramilitary thing, a hangover from the Troubles, when Catholics and Protestants policed their own areas and handed out vigilante justice to drug dealers and joy-riders. A bullet through the knees. A couple of rounds with a baseball bat. One thing was sure, you didn’t forget in a hurry. O’Neill thought about the ASBOs the PSNI gave out for the same thing. A curfew? In bed by ten? No wonder the kids laughed in their faces.

With a punishment beating the victim never pressed charges. There were never any witnesses. Victim dragged from a crowded bar? Folk were always in the toilet. Peelers joked that Belfast pubs had some of the largest toilets in the world. Entire bars had been known to all go for a piss at exactly the same time. What were the odds of that?

No one pressed charges and after a while, a punishment beating went away. A few forms, a few questions, that was it. A murder inquiry though, a murder inquiry had legs. It always went the distance.

If all men were created equal, all victims certainly weren’t. You’d hear people:

‘He deserved what he got.’

‘Fucking wee hood.’

‘He had it coming to him.’

O’Neill peered into the black river as it flowed under Queen’s Bridge and out into Belfast Lough. Anything tossed in – a bat, say – would be long gone. He knew the stats. PSNI solved three out of four murders. Northern Ireland hospitals had treated over 300 punishment beatings last year. The cops hadn’t made an arrest for a single one.

O’Neill felt Ward standing beside him.

Up front on
this
one?

He looked at the rain, pulling out another cigarette. There was no doubt about it: someone up there
didn’t
like him. At least it was one thing he could be sure of.

Marty and Petesy were hoods.

Hoods because they wore tracksuits. Because they stood on street corners and stared down traffic. Because they hung outside off licences, drinking Buckfast and White Lightning. Because they were fifteen and hadn’t been to school for two years. They liked it that way. So did the school. Hoods because security guards followed them round shops. Because every second word was ‘fuck’ or ‘cunt’. Because they loved getting off their faces. Because they liked happy hardcore. Because they stole cars. Because they were joy-riders. Because they were drug dealers. Because they had shaved heads, black eyes and baseball caps. Because they didn’t give a fuck, because what the fuck are you looking at, because I’ll knock your fucking ballicks in. They were hoods.

It was half ten on Monday morning. The boys had been busy. They hunkered behind a large bin in an entry off High Street. The alley smelled of piss and rotting food. Marty and Petesy sucked in air, trying to get their breath back.

‘You’re a mad bastard,’ Petesy said. Marty raised his eyebrows, taking the compliment and smiling.

‘The guard was a fat cunt. He couldn’t catch a fucking cold. Mind you, he fairly got a hold of you. Fuck me, Petesy. My ma’s quicker than you are.’

‘Fuck away off,’ Petesy said. ‘You were running before we were even in the door.’

Marty had always been quick. When he was selected for the Belfast U-12s the coach said he was greased lightning, one of the quickest things he’d even seen on a football pitch.

‘No flies on you, Martin Toner.’

Marty was kicked off the team three weeks later. Fighting. He’d skinned the full-back, some brick shithouse from Ballymacarrett, who’d brought him down. Marty got up and whacked him. It was only training, but so fuck, what were you going to do. There were no flies on Marty.

That morning the security guard had grabbed Petesy, and Marty had had to go back for him. Now he pulled off his old jersey and put on the white Kappa top, courtesy of the morning’s outing. Marty adopted a mock melodic voice, like he was announcing the football results.

‘Martin Toner one – JJB Sports nil.’

JJBs was one of the only shops in Belfast that didn’t have foreigners working as security guards. Lithuanians. Poles. You didn’t fuck with
them.

‘Hard to make a living these days,’ Marty had said after his first and last encounter with the latest addition to the Northern Irish workforce.

Before they showed up, it was a piece of piss. The security men were all locals. Guys that didn’t give a shit. They stood round all day, chatting up sixteen-year-old shop assistants. They’d chase you round the corner and give up. The Polish guys, the Lithuanians, they were different. Chase you for miles. Like it was personal. Like it was their shop or something.

‘It’s fucked up,’ Marty said, after his one experience with a Lithuanian security guard. He’d run full pelt the whole way down Donegal Place, past the
Belfast Telegraph,
all the way down York Street.

‘I was near in Carrickfergus before he stopped. I mean, what the fuck does he care?’

‘No flies on those Poles,’ Petesy joked.

In the entry off High Street, Marty stroked the sleeve of his new top. He leaned off the wall, not wanting to get it dirty. Petesy laughed.

‘I thought I was fucked when your man had me. Next thing, I turn round and he’s got the fucking Tasmanian Devil on his back.’

Marty held up his fists, kissing the right then the left.

‘Told you. I taught Muhammad Ali everything he knew.’

‘That’s what your ma said.’

‘Away and fuck yourself. You’d be in the back of a peeler wagon right now if it wasn’t for me. Who’s the one with a new top? Meanwhile you’re walking round looking like Stig of the Dump.’

‘Up your hole. You bolted before we were even inside the shop.’

Marty peeked round the bin and down the entry. There was no sign of anyone. He pulled out a packet of Regal and lit one. He took a drag and exhaled, clicking out three neat smoke-rings. He then passed the cigarette to Petesy.