Crowe cut the engine. She took in the grey concrete walls, the narrow windows with rusted grilles and the broken boundary fencing. The Oasis Centre looked anything but that.
She opened the door and slung her bag over her shoulder.
As she crossed the potholed tarmac, a man stepped out from behind a large metal door. He lit up a cigarette, crumpled the box, lobbed it in the air, and kicked it a good ten feet, so it landed just in front of her.
‘Like Aguero that. Back . . . of . . . the . . . net.’ A smile spread across his face and he pulled deeply.
Crowe was not in the mood for senseless banter, particularly about football.
‘Lynn in there?’ she asked.
The man’s smile evaporated.
Crowe was used to it. She was dressed in a zip-up jacket, dark blue jeans and black runners, but still she was regularly clocked as a detective. The locals had that sixth sense when it came to a garda, plain clothes or otherwise. The bulge on the right side of her hip did tend to be a giveaway.
He nodded to the door.
She pressed a black button and the door cranked open. There was a basic room inside, bright, with a battered sofa. She nearly hopped when the door clanged shut behind her.
‘Thought ya were Marco.’
The voice came from a woman in a glass-partioned room to her left.
‘I’m looking for Lynn Bolger.’
Lynn was close to Ms King. That’s what the neighbour had told Crowe earlier.
‘She’s with someone,’ the woman said, nodding to the room beside her.
Crowe stood there for a second, before copping the woman wasn’t going to say anything more. She shifted awkwardly and moved to the sofa.
She placed her bag beside her and sat upright. She tried to look composed.
Her right hand came to rest down the edge of the cushion, which was torn and frayed. She grabbed a thin line of material and began wrapping it around a finger, undoing it and wrapping again. When she realised what she was doing she took her hand up, placed it on her bag and inwardly chastised herself.
Next, she busied herself studying the noticeboard on the wall opposite. One note was emblazoned ‘Centre Rules’.
‘No dealing, no using on premises. Show respect to each other and staff. No verbal or physical abuse. Remember, you’re not an addict, you’re a human being. Act like one.’
Crowe pursed her lips, impressed.
A while later, there was a motion from behind a door. The handle creaked and voices spilled out. A hard-looking woman – squat, with short brown hair – glanced at Crowe as she walked another woman to the door.
Must be Lynn.
The woman turned to face her, but said nothing.
‘Lynn Bolger?’ Crowe asked, holding her belt as she stood up.
The woman nodded, glancing at Crowe’s hip.
‘Would I be able to talk to you, in private?’
Lynn raised her right eyebrow, then stepped towards her room. Crowe pulled her jacket over her holster and followed.
The room was bigger than she expected. There was a large table with six or seven chairs around it. In the corner were kitchen units, with a sink. They were shiny orange, seventies style. They looked like something that had been ripped out during a house renovation and stuck in here. To her left was a desk, with a heap of paper and a packet of John Player Blue resting on top.
‘I’m Detective Garda Tara Crowe,’ she said, rooting out her badge from her bag.
Lynn stood there, impassive.
‘I’m here in relation to Ms King,’ Crowe said, putting her badge away. ‘I believe you knew her well.’
No response. Lynn just eyed her.
This could be a waste of time.
But she persisted.
‘Do you know why I might be here?’
‘Yeah,’ Lynn said, walking around her desk, ‘to find out who killed Mary.’
Crowe reared back.
‘Why do you say that?’
‘Why else are ya here?’
‘Well, we’re investigating all the circumstances of . . .’
‘What? How come she died a couple of days after meeting youse?’
Crowe couldn’t hide her reaction. She wasn’t expecting this.
This woman is going to lash me out of it.
She berated herself for not being better prepared.
‘I shouldn’t be even talking to ya,’ Lynn continued, pointing her finger towards the door. ‘Do ya know what could happen to me if they find out I’m talking to the garda?’ She leaned forward to emphasise her point. ‘That even cross yer mind when ya just walked in here for anyone to see?’
Crowe wanted to apologise, but fought the urge.
‘No,’ Lynn said, ‘didn’t think so.’
Crowe thought about taking the typical garda approach: throw her weight around and demand some fucking answers. That’s what the lads in the unit would do. But she knew that all it would do was rub someone like Lynn up the wrong way.
‘Can we just sit down for a moment?’ she suggested, after taking a breath.
Lynn hesitated. The muscles in her face and neck flexed. With a sigh, she dragged a chair out from her desk. Crowe sat at the table and took out a notepad from her bag.
‘Did Ms King tell you about who was hassling her?’
Lynn shifted in her seat, giving Crowe another once over.
‘Couple of heavies came to her door a while . . .’
‘She give a description?’
‘Foreign lads, Eastern European. But they’re just goons, paid by the Canal Gang to intimidate.’
‘When was that?’
‘A month or so ago.’
‘Thanks. You were saying?’
‘They wanted to know where Leo was. She doesn’t, didn’t, know. They said, “Okay, ya owe ten thousand.”’
‘For the drugs that were seized off Leo?’
Lynn nodded. ‘Told her if she didn’t pay up, they’d light up her house, then track down Leo and chop him up. She was in bits. And . . .’
Crowe looked up from her notes; Lynn was shifting in the seat again.
‘A couple of days ago she told me her wipers were broken off,’ Lynn went on, emotion stealing into her voice. ‘I tried to play it down, told her it just be kids messing. But now I knows it was part of the intimidation.’
Lynn turned her face to the side.
‘Ms Bolger,’ Crowe said gently, ‘none of this is your fault.’
‘Damn fucking right,’ Lynn shouted, rearing off her seat, jabbing a finger at Crowe. ‘It’s bleeding youse that are at fault.’
Crowe grabbed at her notepad as it slipped off her lap. The sides of her neck warmed.
‘What do you mean?’ she asked, cursing the timidity in her own voice.
‘I told her about this new garda system,’ Lynn waved her finger about, ‘confidential system – well, supposed to be – for families terrorised by gangs. She met that Sergeant Flynn fella from the drugs unit in town last week. Now she’s dead.’ Lynn looked straight at her. ‘Ya telling me they didn’t find out?’
The palm of Crowe’s hand went all sweaty. She wiped it on her jeans and avoided making eye contact.
‘They did,’ Lynn pressed, ‘didn’t they? The pricks.’
Crowe pushed a loose hair behind her ear and looked up at her.
‘Ms Bolger, there’s no evidence of that. We are only at the early stage . . .’
‘Ah here, if yer going to waste me time, just get out.’
Crowe watched Lynn shove the chair in with a slap.
I have to salvage something from this.
‘Ms Bolger, we will be thorough, that’s all I can say.’
Lynn walked over to the sink and poured out a glass of water. She leaned her thickset arms against the units and swallowed large gulps.
‘Did you tell anyone else?’
‘What do ya think?’ Lynn uttered between gasps.
‘Would Ms King have?’
‘Not a chance,’ Lynn said, refilling her glass. ‘Well, except Pat.’
‘Who?’
‘Pat, Father Keogh. Mary was religious. Fat lot of good it did her. Ya must know Pat. He knows everyone, and everything; at least he thinks he does.’
‘Would he have told anyone?’
‘Pat? No,’ Lynn said, turning to her, the redness in her face receding. ‘He’s a bit sanctimonious, interfering, but not stupid. He’s had his own share of run-ins with the gangs.’
Lynn walked back to her desk. She looked more composed now and Crowe thought she might get more out of her.
‘Ya best go,’ Lynn said, grabbing her smokes and looking up at the clock. ‘It’s late and I have to check in on a few people.’
Typical. Never get your hopes up.
But still she pushed.
‘What can you tell me about the Canal Gang?’ Crowe asked. ‘I’d like to know more about them.’
Puzzlement jostled with annoyance on Lynn’s face. She tapped the packet of John Player a couple of times, leaned back against the desk.
‘Nothing does move around here without Ghost either knowing about it or in the thick of it.’
Crowe knew the name as she scribbled her notes. The lads in drugs were kept busy by him. But he’d never been caught or charged with anything major, as far as she knew.
‘Cracko is Ghost’s debt collector,’ Lynn said. ‘Nasty bastard. Ghost and him rule this area. Ghost does be getting kids to do all his errands.’
Crowe felt she was getting somewhere. There could be a connection between Ghost and a kid being used to threaten Ms King. But, she knew Lynn could stop any second.
‘Kids?’ she asked.
Lynn passed the cigarette packet from hand to hand.
‘Ghost recruits them,’ she said. ‘Picks kids from bad homes and no homes. He gives them a purpose, throws them a few bob. I’m talking as young as eight, nine, ten year olds. He does have them running and hiding stuff, harassing families, all that. The garda can’t touch them kids, because they do be under the age of criminal responsibility. Then Ghost has the teenagers doing the dealing on the canal, in the parks, outside the shops, on the Luas, each with their own little patch. They all work for themselves, their own crews. But Ghost owns the patches and he controls the supply.’
Crowe scratched down her notes while trying to listen.
‘People around here keep their heads down and eyes closed,’ Lynn said. ‘They don’t feel safe – safe from the gangs. And Mary won’t be the last one to suffer.’
Lynn pushed herself off the desk. Crowe thought she was heading for the door, but Lynn stepped right square up to her face.
‘Mary’s death doesn’t matter to youse.’
Crowe was about to say something, to defend herself and the force.
But Lynn wasn’t finished.
‘It’ll take something awful, something fucking terrible, before youse lot, before society, does wake up to what’s going on in areas like this. And, I tell ya what,’ she said, jabbing a finger at her, ‘I have a bad feeling that’s going to happen pretty fucking soon.’