Wolf Tickets (5 page)

"Fuck you talking about?"

"You know I'm still straight, right?"

"You what?"

"Hey, there's nothing wrong with it, Jimmy. It's a lifestyle choice—"

"Fuckin' hetero's not allowed to like Judy Garland now, is that it?"

"I'm not saying that."

"You're a fine one to talk with your Silk Cut fuckin' Ultra, pal."

I looked at the cigarette. "That was Nora."

"Aye, I bet it was. Listen, tell you what, here's one you'll like." Cobb skipped through some tracks. Judy started singing about waking up one morning and hearing a joyful song. Started going on about March 17
^th
being a great day for the Irish.

I listened for a full minute. Then, just as Judy went all blarney on us, I rolled down the side window, took out the disc and spun it out onto the road.

"The fuck d'you do that for?" said Cobb.

"It's racist."

"Judy Garland is not a fuckin' racist."

"She said begorrah."

"It's just a fuckin' song."

"You ever been to Dublin?"

"No."

"Everyone's wearing Claddagh rings – Jesus, some of them have 'em tattooed on their fingers to go with the Celtic bands on their fucking arms. Can't move for the begorrah and bejappers, got fucking Yanks everywhere looking for their ancestors in the bogs. It's a green and ginger theme park, Jimmy. A fucking Lucky Charms commercial."

"So?"

"So I get enough of it over there, I don't need it here, too."

Cobb was quiet for a moment. Then he sniffed. He said, "I'm not a racist."

"I know. You're just misguided."

"Get fucked."

"Then Judy's misguided."

"She's misunderstood," said Cobb. "Mental bitch just needed a bit of love."

And with that, Cobb pulled into a car park and killed the engine.

"We here?" I said.

Cobb got out of the car. I grabbed my bag and joined him. Cobb walked fast with his head down, heading for a tower block that seemed to have more board in the windows than glass. If I thought the piss smell on the twelve flights of stairs was bad, it was nothing compared to the slap in the face I got the second we walked into Cobb's flat.

"Jesus, Jimmy."

"What?"

"What'd you kill in here, and is it not about time you buried it?"

Cobb sauntered into the hall, either oblivious or used to it by now. I followed, sniffing all the time, trying to place the source. Probably the bathroom, one of Cobb's floaters left to grow a fur coat. Cobb grabbed my bag off me, chucked it onto the couch.

"You'll be alright with the settee?" he said.

"That's grand."

"Drink?"

"Anything other than the Rotgut?"

Cobb went through to the kitchen. I heard him opening and closing doors. "I got some stubbies."

"That'll do."

There were books everywhere, stacked on loose shelves in the corner, half-open and littering the floor like dead birds. A couple of wooden chairs that looked as if they'd been purloined from the same back yard where Cobb had found the couch. Down by one side lay a mess of free weights. Over on the other side of the room, a cheap Alba stereo, stacks of CDs next to it, half of them out of their cases. A bachelor pad for the terminally lonely.

"How you been getting on, Jimmy?"

"Eh?"

Cobb reappeared with a couple of stubbies. A cheap own-brand Belgian piss-lager, but better than whatever spirits he had in. Cobb always had been a quantity over quality man.

"I said, how you been getting on."

"Not bad." Cobb dropped to the couch, rested his free hand on top of my bag. "Nowt fantastical, but I do okay. I get by."

"Still robbing from charity shops?"

Cobb didn't say anything. He didn't need to. I picked up one of the books, had a woman with big blonde hair, wearing sunglasses. She had a wedge of cash and a peace medallion in one hand, in the other a gun. Hardly John Banville.

"Good one, that," said Cobb. "Got the rest of the series around here somewhere."

I dropped the book on the arm of the chair. "You're doing okay, then."

"Aye."

I nodded. "Been in trouble?"

Cobb smiled. "When?"

"Recently."

"How recently?"

"Fuck's sake, Jimmy,
recently
. Six months, say."

"Why?"

I took a swig from the stubbie. "Just thinking something through. Your nose clean?"

"Never convicted."

"Any interest from the blues, though? Sniffers?"

"No."

"Anyone else? Any debts running I should know about?"

"I know better than that."

"Just, you said you were brassic—"

He said it again, harder: "I know better than that."

"Okay."

"Something you should know, all the time you was shacked up with your tart, I was living the quiet life." Cobb made a show of stretching his legs, made a groaning noise to go with it. "All I've been doing is sitting on this settee and drinking and smoking and reading and listening to me tunes. I get me giro every fortnight and Social have taken the fuckin' hint to stop nagging us about permanent employment. Everything's peachy as fuck."

"And you're bored out of your mind."

"Aye." He bobbed his head. "There is that."

I went over to one of the wooden chairs and sat down on another book. A thin one. There was a painting of a guy shaving his head on the front. He looked the way I felt. I turned it over, tossed it onto the floor. "I might have something."

"Okay."

"Bit of money in it for you."

"Even better."

"I know we didn't part ways on the best of terms, so I know there's no reason for you to help me."

"Don't be daft. We're mates."

I nodded. "Yeah."

"Anything you need."

"A gun."

"I know."

"A little help with tracking down Nora."

"And then?"

I looked at him. He was staring right back.

"And then?" I said.

"What you going to do when you find her?"

"Get the money."

"If she doesn't have it?"

"She stole from me."

"But you won't kill her or owt."

"I don't know that yet."

Cobb laughed. "You're a murderer like I'm Barbra Streisand."

I stood up. "You need to get on the phone to your squaddie mate."

"Alright."

"And don't be so fucking sure about what I will and won't do. I already killed once today, Jimmy, so if you want in on this, you might have to brush up on 'The Way We Were'."

They used to call the place The Ridges back in the thirties. Late sixties, they changed the name to Meadow Well in an attempt to roll a turd in glitter. By the early nineties, the police wouldn't come out to emergency calls anymore because they were getting fuckin' bricked every time they showed their snouts. Then there was that accident with the boys, the place blew up, everything went to shit, and then they tried to build it all up again, this time painted in primary colours.

This was where Goose lived. He called himself Goose on account of he lost a leg on Goose Green in '82. Nobody really believed him, but nobody really gave a fuck, either, because Goose was a dealer, and you never pissed off the man holding product.

Anyway, he was a fuckin' prick, and from what I knew, he hadn't gotten any nicer since I saw him last. The more narcotics he poured, stuck or snorted, the more pissed off and paranoid he got. Last I heard, he wasn't even really dealing anymore – he had skivvies out doing his fuckin' dirty work for him – so I had no idea what the fuck he'd turned into without a reason to get up in the morning.

Trouble was, this was the only gadgie I knew who had a gun. He probably wouldn't sell it, right enough, but I reckoned that he might know a fella who would. It was worth a try, anyway.

"You alright, Jimmy?"

I nodded, but I didn't mean it. I got out of the car, leaned on the roof. I saw Farrell's nose twitch.

"Smells like chip fat round here," he said.

"I don't smell nowt."

"Living where you do, Jimmy, I'm not surprised."

I went forward, knocked on Goose's front door. It moved under my fist. You could hear the war going on inside, bombs and screams and the rattle of machine guns.

Farrell looked at us, smirking.

I looked back, like:
Don't get fuckin' giddy. I'm in charge
.

If he understood, he didn't show it.

"It's open," shouted Goose.

I pushed the door, led the way. At the end of the hall, I could see the edge of Goose's wheelchair. A bit closer, and there he was, the man himself, hunched over a plastic table that clipped onto the arms of his chair. The television was blaring away in the corner of the room, had on that Colin Firth thing from the eighties, the one where he gets paralysed. I'd seen it in bits and bobs about a million fuckin' times back when I had a habit, and it looked like Goose still kept the thing on a loop to add gunfire to his day. It made us a bit sick to look at, to be honest. I wondered if Goose had put it on special.

Goose raised his head with a snort that made it sound like something was loose in the centre of his head. He pulled on his nose, blinked at us. "Jimmy-son. Long time. How's it going?"

"Not so bad."

"Who's your boyfriend?"

"That's Farrell. He's a mate of mine."

"Howyeh," said Farrell.

Goose stared at him. He sniffed and said, "He's a fuckin' mick."

"A fucking
paddy
, actually."

"A
cheeky
fuckin' mick. Let me guess, youse two were in the forces together, were you?"

"Aye," I said.

The smile wavered. "You're kidding."

"No."

He pointed at Farrell. "You were in the Queen's?"

"Yes."

"
Our
forces?"

"He's quick, isn't he?"

"You must have a pair, boy," said Goose. "You were in the same time as James here, you must have a pair the size of fuckin' watermelons. Sit down. You're making us nervous standing there like a bailiff."

Farrell looked around, opted for an armchair. He got settled in, crossed his legs and smiled at Goose.

"So what is it?" said Goose. "Last I heard, you was off everything except the drink and I reckoned, fuckin'
bonus
for you, eh? Clean as, well done. So I'm guessing you're not round here to score."

"I'm not."

"Aye, you look too clean." Goose ran his tongue over his top teeth, glanced across at Farrell. "Fuck's he smiling at?"

"You," said Farrell.

"Oh aye?" Goose's hand twitched once, then slid under the table. "You want to watch that, like. Smiling at people when you're not properly acquainted. It's like coming round to your old dealer's house when you're not on the powder anymore. It's got a way of making a fella suspicious about your fuckin' motives, know what I mean? Makes a fella think that maybe youse two aren't on the straight, that maybe you've taken one look at the sweet set-up I have here and thought you'd take a slice of it for yourselves. And I'll tell you now, if you're thinking that, you're not right in the head. From what I remember about
you
, Jimmy, you was the one with the moral fibre. Am I right?"

"You're right."

"So what happened to that?"

I didn't answer.

"That's what I thought. See, I know this. Gut instinct."

Talking of which, that was where Goose's hand stopped. On a bulge that definitely wasn't made of him.

"We're not here to rob you," said Farrell.

"Oh aye?"

"We're here to buy," I said.

"I thought you kicked."

"Not blow."

"I need a gun," said Farrell.

Goose looked at him. "I don't sell guns, mate."

"That's not what I heard."

Back to me: "You tell him I sold guns?"

"No."

"Because if that gets out, that's not just the fuckin' polis at my door, that's the whole Armed Response."

"I didn't tell him that. I said you might be able to help. Like you might know a bloke—"

"I don't know anyone what sells fuckin' guns, Jimmy."

I held up both hands. "Okay."

"You want to ask anyone round here if they know any fuckin' gunrunners, you ask your mick mate over there."

Farrell's smile turned into a grin, which wasn't a good sign. He got out of his chair and switched off the television on his way over to Goose.