Priest by Ken Bruen Page B

did fire 1,000 bullets at a cost of around fifty cents each, it was a small price to pay for a man who has put so much into the force.’
    A colleague of departing Garda Commissioner Pat Byrne, who celebrated his retirement on the Phoenix Park indoor firing range.
    Â 
    Sister Mary Joseph was finally beginning to relax. No one had been apprehended for the murder of Father Joyce and no one had come to ask her any questions . . . she dared to hope that her prayers had been answered. It looked like whoever had murdered the poor man was not coming after her. Anyway, she told herself over and over, she had done nothing wrong, but in her heart she knew she had allowed those boys to continue being abused. No matter how many rosaries she said, and no matter how many rationalizations she made, the voice in her head refused to cease its refrain . . .
You knew, you knew those poor creatures were being
horribly abused and you did nothing. It’s a sin of omission, you are as guilty as Father Joyce is.
    But most days, she took shameful comfort in the fact that she hadn’t been found out, no one was accusing her of anything. One boy had begged her, tears streaming down his face, for help. First she had tried to bribe him with chocolate, but he had had an extreme reaction on seeing it, went deathly pale, looked like he was about to faint, and she had read him the riot act, and, God forgive her, she had boxed his ears. She could still see his little face and hear the awful words,
My bum is bleeding.
    Out loud she intoned, ‘Oh, Holy Mother of God, deliver me from this torment.’ The boy had begun to inhabit her dreams, except now his tears were tears of blood.
    Her hair had begun to fall out and she was hoping that this might be penance enough. Apart from Jesus, the only love of her life had been her father and she dreaded to think he’d be ashamed of her. She fell to her knees, began
Ar nathair . . .
(Our Father . . .)
    Â 
    I rang Joe Ryan, a guy I knew from my days as a Guard. He worked as a journalist and, while we were cordial when we met, we weren’t friends or anything in the vicinity. He answered on the second ring and I went through the usual semi-cordial shite till he cut to the chase, went,
    â€˜So, what do you want?’
    I faked some offence and he said,
    â€˜Cut the bollocks, what do you want?’
    I sighed, asked,
    â€˜You know of a kid named Cody? In his twenties, has a quasi-American accent and—’
    He cut me off. If you lived in Galway and had been here any length of time, Joe knew you. He said,
    â€˜All the kids have those accents and yeah, I know him, he’s Liam Farraher’s son. Why?’
    He was a journalist so I decided to confuse him with the truth, said,
    â€˜He wants to be my partner in the – are you ready for this? – the private-eye game.’
    I could hear him laughing, then he said,
    â€˜That’s Liam’s kid, all right. He’s not a bad lad, but – what’s the current buzz word? – finding himself.’
    I let the obvious pun of finding hang there a bit, and then asked,
    â€˜Is he OK? I mean, apart from deluded.’
    More laughter, then,
    â€˜He worked in computers and was pretty damn good, from what I hear, but he obviously wants to lead an exciting life and so has hooked up with you.’
    I let that slide and finally asked,
    â€˜I don’t need to worry about him then, he’s not a nutter or anything?’
    He waited a time, then,
    â€˜Way I see it, they’re in their twenties, they’re all deranged.’
    What I really wanted to ask was, could I trust him? I went,
    â€˜Can I trust him?’
    He laughed again, said,
    â€˜Jeez, Jack, you have a way of putting things, you know that? Take a look round you. This is the new Ireland, no one believes in the Government or the Clergy, and as for the banks, forget it, they’re robbing us blind and admitting it. The only