Read Online The Cold, Cold Ground by Adrian McKinty - Free Book Online Page B

It was late and the place was emptying out.
    I borrowed a couple of ciggies from someone’s table and headed out onto the fire escape to think.
    There was trouble up in Belfast again. Potassium nitrate flares falling through the darkening sky. A Gazelle helicopter flying low over the lough water. Little kids walking past the police station showing each other the best technique for lobbing Molotov cocktails over the fence. Jesus, what a nightmare.
    This was a city crucified under its own blitz.
    This was a city poisoning its own wells, salting its own fields, digging its own grave …

3: A DIFFERENT MUSIC
    I smoked the fags and when the rain came I climbed back inside, locked the evidence in the CID room and drove home.
    The cows were gone. The cow shit had been scraped up and bagged by entrepreneurs. Mrs Campbell told me all about the great bovine escape and how Arthur’s prized roses had been ruined and how he would be furious when he got back from the North Sea, which wouldn’t, she added, be for two more long, lonely weeks.
    I went into the kitchen and made myself a pint-glass vodka gimlet. I threw frozen chips in the deep fat fryer and dumped a can of beans in a pot. I fried two eggs and ate them with the chips and beans.
    At seven o’clock I shaved and changed into a shirt, my black jeans, leather jacket and DM shoes. I put on a black leather waistcoat. It looked good but there was a slight Han Solo vibe so I hung it back in the cupboard.
    I went out. A stray dog began walking beside me. Black lab. Cheerful looking character. Victoria Estate had dozens of stray dogs and cats, fed, and sometimes adopted, by the local children.
    I was halfway along Barn Road when a guy ran out of his house wearing a white singlet and waving a ten-pound sledgehammer.
    â€œNow you’re going to get it!” he screamed at me. “You’re really going to get it!”
    â€œFor what?”
    â€œYour dog just took a dump against my gate. I finally caught you, you dirty bastard! You and your dirty dog. You are going topay, mate! Oh yes!”
    â€œThat’s not my dog,” I said.
    His consternation and disappointment knew no bounds. I could sympathize: there is nothing,
nothing
in this world more deflating than the realization that the lumping villain who has been tormenting you is not going to get an arse-kicking after all.
    He asked me if I was sure it was not my dog but I just kept walking.
    I went by a DeLorean broken down on the Scotch Quarter, gull wings askew, steam coming from its rear engine, which did not bode well.
    The Dobbins was deserted and I got a seat next to the massive sixteenth-century fireplace. I ordered a Guinness, took out my notebook and looked over my bullet points from the day. Twelve pages of notes. Lots of questions marks and exclamation points. This was a case already spiralling out of control.
    I nursed my pint until 9.30.
    She didn’t show.
    â€œThe hell with it!” I said, got up and began walking home along West Street.
    â€œSergeant Duffy!” she called out.
    I turned. She was wearing old jeans and a red blouse, ratty sneakers. She hadn’t dressed up and her hair was wet. Spur of the moment decision?
    We went back in. I got her a gin and tonic. Another pint for me.
    â€œLook, it’s a wee bit late in the game to ask this but …” I began.
    â€œYes?”
    â€œWhat’s your name?”
    She laughed. “I must have told you.”
    â€œNope.”
    â€œLaura.”
    â€œMine’s Sean.”
    â€œI know. Although I bet they all call you the fenian or the left footer or something, don’t they?”
    â€œWho? The other cops?”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œIt’s not like that. At least not to my face. The constables call me ‘Duffy’ or ‘Sergeant Duffy’. I’m Sean to everybody else except Carol who calls me Mr Sean cos she’s from Fermanagh. I’m only mildly exotic. Catholic hiring