A Turn for the Bad (17 page)

“If we were in Dublin, I'd have a better shot at guessing,” Gillian said.

“Fine—what would be a problem in Dublin?”

“The odd mugging or lifting someone's wallet—you can usually spot the guys trying it on, but rarely do the gardaí there worry themselves over that petty stuff unless it's a team of guys working a crowd. More likely drugs and thugs.”

“We don't usually see much of that around here,” Maura said. Except for that recent incident, and it had turned out that her attacker was involved with drug dealing in Cork city. Sean's “secret” weighed heavily on her. Would it hurt to give a hint to Gillian? “But Sean kind of hinted the other day that there might be something going on and it might have something to do with drugs.”

Gillian stared at her for a moment, then burst out laughing. “Maura, there's nothing new to that. Moving things about, and turning a blind eye, has been going on in West Cork since the days of the pirates. So Sean thinks there's something important happening?”

“You didn't hear it from me,” Maura said. “And you can't tell anyone.”

“And who would I be telling?” Gillian thought for a moment. “Do you know, it might have something to do with that dead man they pulled out of the water last week.”

Maura had almost forgotten him, which didn't seem right. The gardaí had declared that no one was missing from their area, so he must be from somewhere else, although where was still unknown. But he was undeniably dead. “He wasn't Irish, but it's not clear how he died. You think it's connected?”

“Maura, few people turn up dead around here, as you may have noticed. If he's not a local man, what could he have been doing here?”

Maura shivered. “I think I'll build up the fire a little more—I'm cold.”

For all that it was a Saturday, business was slow. Part of that was due to the rain, now falling nearly sideways, pushed by the strong wind—straight into her front windows. Maura kept the fire going in Sullivan's, but peat was slow to burn and didn't provide much warmth, so it was fighting a losing battle against the dark and damp.

Or, Maura acknowledged, it could be that the word had spread that the search for John Tully was all but over and that had depressed people, so they had stayed home. Without proof that he was dead, it was hard to mourn for the missing man, but most people had lost hope, it seemed. Would things pick up in the evening?

Gillian had found a tattered crossword puzzle and was settled in a corner working on it. Mick was due to come in around lunchtime; Maura had called Jimmy and told him
that he and Rose shouldn't bother to show up until later in the day, since there were no customers. It would look silly for all of her pub staff to be standing around polishing the same glasses over and over, waiting for a single request for a pint. It was still well before noon when Maura looked up to see a man come in, shoving the door shut behind him. He looked vaguely familiar, but it took Maura a moment to place him: John Tully's brother, the farmer. Conor, was it? He looked like he had aged ten years since Maura had seen him the week before. Leap was a bit out of his territory, but maybe he wanted some quiet time away from all the neighbors offering their sympathy. Or maybe he wanted a break from holding John's wife, Nuala, together as they all waited for news that probably wasn't going to come.

Conor slid onto a bar stool, wobbling slightly, and Maura wondered if he'd already stopped at a pub or two since opening time. “A pint. Please.”

“Sure,” Maura said, and began filling a glass. “You're Conor Tully, aren't you?”

The man gave her a long, bleak stare before answering. “I am. And right now I'm damned tired of being Conor Tully.”

Maura held up her hands. “I get it—you want some peace. I won't bother you.” She topped off the pint of Guinness. When she slid it in front of Conor, she was surprised when he said, “Yer not from around here, are yeh?”

“No, I'm from Boston, in the States. I inherited this place from Mick Sullivan last spring—he was a relative of my grandmother's.”

“Ah,” Conor said, taking a long pull at his pint. “Must be nice not to have yer whole damn town breathin' down
yer neck, askin' stupid questions. ‘Have they found him yet?' ‘What do you think happened?' As if they think I know.” Conor stared into the black depths of his glass. “The thing of it is,” he said softly, almost to himself, “I do.”

It took Maura a moment to realize what Conor had just said. He knew what had happened to his brother? Why hadn't he told anyone, like the gardaí? And how the hell was she supposed to respond to what he'd said? She looked around: Gillian in the corner, no sign yet of Old Billy, and one other man reading an out-of-date newspaper in the corner. No one to overhear. The law-abiding side of her wanted to call the gardaí immediately, but she realized that if Conor wanted them to know, he'd had a week to tell them himself. Or maybe he was speaking in the broadest of terms, like
John is in a better place now
or
He's roasting in Hell
. Maybe she needed to see if he had anything to add.
Maura, you're a bartender, and it's your job to listen
.

“Why do you say that?” she asked quietly.

“It's complicated,” he said, avoiding her eyes. He did, however, scan the room as she had, taking in the meager crowd. Then he downed his pint and shoved the glass toward her. “Another.”

Okay, if he wanted to get drunk, that was his business—as long as he didn't drive anywhere in the awful weather. But if he did get drunk—and it looked to Maura as though he'd already reached a halfway point—he might be willing to speak more freely about what he'd hinted at. She could deal with getting him home later.

“Coming up,” she said, and started another glass.

The pub was strangely quiet except for the rain lashing against the windows. There was no conversation going on;
nobody had turned on the television over the bar. It was as if the place was waiting for something. What would Old Mick, who she'd never met, have done? Probably served up the pint and ignored Conor after that—kind of a “live and let live” policy that had apparently served him well for years. On the other hand, if she let Conor get sloshed and he ended up spilling his guts, she could call the gardaí later and pass on what he might have said. If he said anything that mattered. She made her decision.

“Is John dead?” she asked, pitching her voice low enough so no one else could hear.

Conor shook his head. “I don't know. I don't know if he is, and I don't know if he isn't. But he may be alive, and that's what's drivin' me mad.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because I'm an eejit and he got dragged into my business for no reason. He shouldn't have been where he was.”

Maybe that was progress. What should she ask next? “And what business would that be?”

“Shipping,” he said, his tone ironic. “There was a shipment due that day when John took it into his head to take a stroll along the beach with his boy.”

Maura assumed that the shipment did not consist of beach balls or hand-knit Irish sweaters, but she really didn't want to know the details. “What went wrong?”

“The boat came in to check the landing site for the delivery, and there was John, large as life, sittin' on his favorite rock and contemplatin' the universe. And keepin' an eye on young Eoin, fer John's a good father. Now, John's no fool, and when he saw the little boat headin' fer shore he knew what was what, fer it shouldn't have been there and it was
no one he knew. And he might have tipped his cap and gone about his business, fer there's more than enough of that kind of delivery goes on around here. It was the others on the boat who panicked. They could've shot him then and there, but then they saw the boy. They could have shot the pair of them . . .” Conor took another long swallow from his glass, as if to fortify himself for the telling of his story. “But, God be thanked, they couldn't bring themselves to kill a child or to kill the father with the child lookin' on. So they grabbed John and they bundled him into the boat and turned around to go back to the big ship and let someone else decide what to do.”

And left the child behind to fend for himself, but it could have been worse. Now Maura had more questions than she could handle at once, but she was still afraid of spooking Conor. “Let me see if I've got this right. John and Eoin were walking on the beach, which happened to be the site for a delivery that was supposed to be secret. The, uh, deliverymen saw him and didn't know what to do, so they took him away and left Eoin alone on the beach. There was a bigger boat waiting for them somewhere?”

Conor nodded. “The ones who came in the small boat, they're only the hired help, and none too smart. But the big boat can't handle the shallows in the cove, so they sent the men with the little one to check things out.”

The questions swirled in Maura's head and then narrowed down to one large, important one. “Conor, how do you know this?”

He looked at her with sad spaniel eyes. “Because I was waitin' to meet the men on the beach. I gave out the story that Nuala had sent me there to find John, but that was only
to cover me arse—I woulda been there anyways. I went a bit faster when I heard where John had gone.”

Suddenly a lot of pieces fell into place. “John didn't know about it? He really was just taking a walk and lost track of time?” Maura said.

“John's as clean as they come,” Conor said, sounding slightly annoyed. “He's a dairy farmer. He likes what he does. He loves his family and, God help us, I swear he loves his cows as well. But he makes little money and neither do I. So I went lookin' fer a way to bring in a little extra, but I didn't let on to John. Mebbe he knew somethin' had changed, fer he never asked where the extra money was comin' from.”

Maura thought hard. No matter how lousy the weather was, some patrons would be arriving soon, and then she'd lose this private moment with Conor. She had little time to get the whole story. “What did you do?”

“I got there in time to see them take him into the boat. Eoin seemed all right fer the moment. But I knew his mother'd be looking fer him quick, as Eoin is the light of her heart. I couldn't explain to anyone why I'd been there and had done nothin' to stop them. So before I turned around to take Eoin back, I called the number I'd been given and I spoke to the man runnin' the show. By then they had John, and the man sez to me, John would stay alive as long as I kept me mouth shut about the other business. Until they'd made the delivery.”

Oh, crap.
The people on a boat somewhere nearby were holding John hostage until they could deliver a drug shipment—she had to assume it was drugs, and probably more than a little—and clear out. “So you're telling me they didn't kill him, but they're keeping him until the deal goes through and they're clear. Did you believe them?”

“I had to, didn't I? If I thought he was dead . . .” Conor shook his head and took another long drink from his glass. Then he looked back at Maura. “But it cuts both ways. If I learn he's dead, I'll give the gardaí names. I know who they are and who they work with, and I'll tell the whole story. So, sure, they tell me he's alive. Mebbe they're lyin', but what'm I supposed to do? I tell the gardaí now and as soon as they see a patrol boat of any kind, they'll kill me brother and toss him over the side, and then they'll be gone.”

“Why have they waited this long?” Maura asked.

“Because once I told Nuala that John was missin', which I had to do, the search teams were all over the place. They were waitin' fer the search to end before tryin' again. Would've been today, but fer the storm. So it's on fer tomorrow. And once that's done, they'll have no use for John.” Conor stared glumly at the dregs in his glass.

Maura guessed that this was the drug bust that Sean and his colleagues were involved in—although Sean hadn't given her any of the details. Well, suddenly she might know more about it than he did. Shouldn't she just hand Conor over to them and let them get the story and deal with the whole mess? The problem was, Conor seemed to believe that if approached by anyone official, the guys on the boat would kill John and skip out, bound for who knows where, with their shipment intact. That made sense, from their viewpoint. “You know the boat?”

Conor shook his head. “Never seen it. It's a different one each time. We use mobile phones to keep in touch, set things up.”

“Big boat? Small?” Not that any answer would help, since
Maura knew next to nothing about boats, much less those that ferried drug shipments.

“How the hell'm I supposed to know?” Conor said. “Bigger than small, I'm guessin'.”

Maura knew she was in over her head, and John Tully's life might hang in the balance, unless he was already dead. Even if he was, the bad guys in the boat would still sail off at any sign of trouble, and it was a big sea out there, especially if you didn't know what boat you were looking for, and how would the gardaí or the navy or customs ever find them again? And from what Sean had hinted, this was a really big deal for local law enforcement.

If she couldn't tell the gardaí or any other official authorities, what
could
she do?

Rescue John Tully
.

The words came to her clear as a bell, and she had to swallow hysterical laughter. She was clueless about boats. She knew nothing about the local geography, especially the water kind, like coves and rocks and where to tie up a boat. She had no idea how to find an unknown boat in a big ocean, much less confront armed drug runners.
Think, Maura, think.

Once her first panic had cleared, ideas began to trickle in. There was a fishing port across the harbor: that meant there must be fishermen there somewhere over in Union Hall. Who knew the local waters and had boats. Who had every reason to be on the open water without scaring off anyone.

But if there was a fancy yacht out there laden with . . . whatever is was . . . they probably wouldn't accept a fishing boat cozying up alongside and asking if John Tully just
happened to be on board. Which meant they'd need the fishermen's big boats to find the yacht—which by now had been hanging around for a week, waiting for the search to wind down and then the weather to clear, and some fisherman must have seen it. And once they found it, they'd have to find a smaller boat to sneak up on the yacht and actually rescue the man.
Yeah, right
.

She looked up at Conor, who was regarding her oddly. “What're you thinkin'?” he asked.

“I'm trying to figure out how we can get your brother back without all hell breaking loose.”