The Return
The Gurrier sniffed the night air apprehensively. A cold wind was blowing in from the East, sweeping over the torpid depths of the Liffey, snaking down the city’s back streets and chilling The Gurrier’s old bones. Something was amiss in the city, he could feel it in his waters. Something had come back to Dublin town, something from over the sea. Someone had come home.
The Gurrier made a quick mental inventory of his enemies and acquaintances, the term being somewhat interchangeable within his circle of associates. The Bastard Kesey was occupied with his new acquisitions to the West in Clondalkin. Subduing the natives had proved somewhat more troublesome than The Bastard was accustomed to. For several nights now the sky to the West had been lit by baleful fires. Each morning the acrid smoke hung over the waking city in a black pall. The Authorities as usual studiously ignored Kesey’s dealings with the locals being of the opinion that discretion was the better part of valour and quite fancying the way all their appendages stayed attached.
Heinous had retreated to his Dundrum fastness in the foothills of the Dublin mountains. There to repair the psychic damage accrued through his trials in Phibsboro and the brutal dealings on the North Circular Road. The Sunday World had vowed to ‘Run this Dundrum Dirtbird out of town’. They almost succeeded too. The campaign culminating in a torchlit procession through the streets of the Northside and a mass rally in .Dalymount the highpoint of which was to be a public garrotting. The Gurrier had intervened and ‘Banishment to Ballinteer’ had been agreed as an uneasy compromise. The Gurrier knew that one day Heinous would have to be dealt with once and for all. That day was not today, but it was soon.
Dirty John had fled into the night after The Bastard threatened to send him back to the Panamanian Peg House for good. It was said he lived feral now in the wild woods of Lusk. Occasionally local papers carried stories of children being carried off into the night by hideous manthings clad in rags brandishing crude weapons. It was rumoured there were others out there beyond the Pale, breeding in the hollow caverns and concrete detritus remaining from the construction of the M50. The government denied all knowledge of course but everyone knew what had gone on out there. Dark deeds foretold in the strange lights in the sky that burned with an eerie glow every Lughnasa and then there was the Wickerman incident in the Phoenix park. But no one talks about that.
That was all of them accounted for. The others were all gone now, Quigley to the madness, Connolly to the bum ferrets, and the rest McGovern, Roche, Duff, Wallace nameless faces to him now, passed into legend and beyond. Unless,the Gurrier shivered involuntarily. That only left him. What if he was back? What then? The shiver became a spasm of fear. A single name fled through his chattering teeth,Lynch.
He shook himself out of his terrified reverie. No that couldn’t be. It couldn’t be him. He was gone. He sniffed the air again. “No you old fool The Bastard has you spooked again as usual. Probably some new prototype he’s been testing in the West fields. Put the wind up you. Still couldn’t help to make sure could it? Only one thing for it now,” he sighed inwardly, he’d have to consult with Erroneous.
Tony Erroneous purveyor of falsehoods and half truths, fibs, fables, tall tales and shams. If it happened in Dublin Erroneous would know something, maybe. And could tell you, sort of. It wasn’t ye see that he lied on purpose. Oh no nothing could be further from the truth, much like Erroneous himself. The problem was that whilst everything he could tell you tended to harvest some small grain of truth, a smidgeon of veracity from which the lucky few could garner some small meaning, the rest of what he spouted was all me bollix. Coupled with the fact that he was a man known to have an intimate knowledge of all things liquid and flavoured with porter it was a brave man or a fool who ventured into his company with the intention of extricating the truth. Such was the Gurrier’s task this rainy windswept night as he girded his loins and leaving the warm smoky confines of Mulligans delved ever deeper into the streets of the filthy city.
It was nearly midnight before the Gurrier came upon his quarry deep in conversation with a terrified ‘Amurcan Turrst’ who had foolishly strayed into the shabby environs of The Chancery Inn, a known hangout of criminals and dupes owned of late by the Furious Donnelly’s of Armagh. They had subsequently lost it in a fit of rage to a Tinker from Ballyhaunis, but that’s another tale. During the reign of the Tinker the pub had fallen into some disrepair and it was with some trepidation that the Gurrier parked himself beside the fearful overseas visitor and the floothered fixer. Erroneous to give him his due was not without his merits. The Gurrier had used him on occasion as a source for some of his more outlandish stories. However after subsequent investigations proved these stories to be little more than a badly used tissue of lies and The Gurrier almost losing his unmentionables to an outraged gang of cannibal knackers (so the headline went) he had recently given him a wide berth. Indeed the Gurrier sometimes had trouble telling left from right and the mental gymnastics needed to decipher the oracle like ramblings of Tony Erroneous in full flow were often beyond him. It gave him a pain the face. But there was nothing for it, he had to know.
Erroneous had backed his victim against the bar wedging himself between barstool and exit and was proceeding to regale him with his theory on the ‘Hollywood Irish.’ “Yeh see de ting you fellas don’t understand is that dat it wasn’t dem Jewish lads up dere in the Warner Brothers dat started off the Hollywood piccys and the like. Nat at all, shure it’was the Clancy brothers up beyant in Finglas that smuggyled over de furst ‘talkie’ made right here in Dublin City, starring me old Da and Bang Bang himself, no word of a lie. Directed by Brendan Behan it was, with auld Yeats and Joyce doing the makeup and wardrobe. Fierce theatrical them lads. I was the Best Boy meself. Ah yes that sort of artistic medium runs in the family. Errya wouldja like te see the script I’m working on right now? Yeh see it’s a remake of the the Karaty Kid except he’s Ireland’s first Squash prodigy who’s career is tragically cut short be a crippling nipple injury. Shure doesn’t he end up working as a caretaker in Clongowes were he comes upon a young boy wit prodigious squash talents of his own. It’s a heart rending story of triumph over adversity. I call it ‘The Cripple wit the Nipple.’ No wait come back sure it’s only a working title!” But it was too late. Sensing a brief pause in the conversation the goggling tourist stumbled blindly away from the verbal tirade of bollocks and cod Irish bar room chat.
The Gurrier made his move before Erroneous could be distracted by another round of porter scrounging. Inquiries are made and he braces himself for the ordeal ahead.
Erroneous paused, fingering a hairless patch on skull absently. “Heh, heh great days they were, me and the Lynch down on Parkgate street ramraiding newsagents on our BMX’s. Ah sure we were like Lone Ranger and Tonto me and him. Jaysus but never a day went past when one of us ud be getting the bejaysus beaten out of us be the other. Great days they were. I remember back in ’71 shure I was only a nipper carrying a bag o’ chip butties up to Lynch’s Ma and him up beyant in the flats wit the Da trowin fellas off the top for the laugh. He was a great man for the levity was the Da. And den dere was the time when we were up in the Gorman after we put paraffin in the school boiler and lit the roof off the place. Shure they wanted to send us all te the borstal fer good but didn’t Lynch’s Ma say she’d burst the lot of them if they did that and we went for a plea of insanity and diminished responsibility due to malnutrition and malign foreign influence. Well the Majeystrate took only wan look at Lynch and yer man looking like one lick of a stamp ud kill em and away we went to the Gorman for two month.
A grand auld place the Gorman was back then shure we’d have our tea in the wee lounge with the other mad fellas and after a few spuds and some coddle it ud be off to the TV room for Starsky and Hutch. Grand auld time it was, except for the mad fellas roarin outta them every five minutes and lepping about the place but sure it was better than the North Circular be a long shot. I was sad to go so I was in the end. We’d often talk about pullin’ a thrick or two te get sent back some day. But then ould Jem Mad Bollix O’Reilly from the back estate was sent up there after us and he not the same since. He was a great man for the dogs was Jem. Used chase them round the estate all day shoutin after them. “Gimme back me tea yeh thieving gyppo bastards! I’ll learn yeh for drinkin’ me tea! I’ll be bet into yeh!” he’d be roaring out of him like that fer days. Then one day he got bored wit the dogs and up to the Zoo with him te have a gander at the hairy fellas up there. Well sure I don’t need te tell you what happened after that. Sure it was all over the papers and half the penguin colony in a home for the bewildered and the rest getting’ the valium with their grub for the rest of their natural. Anyway be the end of it the Zoo was off limits fer the whole summer and Jem spent the next three months in the Gorman. But shure he came back a changed man. No more the running after the hairy fellas fer him shure he just used to sit on the wall be the bus stop chewin’ bits o’ Mass cards and reciting the rosary. Never the same man again. I wanst saw him lookin’ sideways at a squirrel a few years later but one flick o’ the red fella’s tail and yer man was off screaming in the other direction. And then there was the time….”
The Gurrier kneaded his temples and tried to bring Erroneous’ attention to the task at hand. He had but a few short hours to extricate a semblance of truth from him and prepare for The Lynch’s return. For if returned he had then defences both physical and otherwise must be put in place. A man like Lynch if man he truly be and not some tragic genetic aberration was not to be met on fair terms. No the Gurrier had seen the pitiful wretches in James Street who had attempted to reason with Mad Lynch. They had a special wing for them in the hospital. A dark shameful place full of tittering perverts. ‘The eyes! The eyes!’ They’d scream crouching against the wall. The Gurrier hadn’t slept for a week. But that’s where he had to go next. Up to James Street to parley with the last unfortunate to cross the Lynch before he left. That poor fucker, if he there was any humanity left in him (a doubtful prospect) before that fateful day the Lynch took it with him to the east and peddled it for booze and loose women.
Once again The Gurrier girded himself for the task of conversing with another mental degenerate. He sighed, sometimes he wondered if all this was really necessary. The melodrama, the constant paranoia, the never ending night terrors. Then he remembered the last time he had ignored the antics of his ‘friends’ and tried to go about his business as a normal member of society. He winced and rubbed the spot where his right nipple used to be. Necessary? It was fucking necessary alright! Dangerous maniacs the lot of them. Who knows what destruction could be wrought upon the unhappy citizens of Dublin if he ignored the dark portents of this evenings events. He had a civic duty, and a fervent wish to keep living with all his remaining nipples intact. Yes they hadn’t found the secret one. Yet.
The Gurrier shuddered and pressed on through the night past the sleeping breweries of James Gate, taking strength from their ancient walls. The air was tinged with a malty hopsy goodness as he approached the gates of James Street Hospital. It was a small matter to gain access to the secure wing of the hospital where the mentalists were kept for their own safety. It was well known about the place that strange and terrible things had gone on here over the years. Builders and contractors who worked on the sprawling campus told dark tales of plague pits filled with misshapen things and mass graves of ventolin inhalers mixed with horse tranquillisers poisoning the groundwater. Chippies would disappear sometimes and turn up weeks later raving and trying to nail their eyelids shut. Young labourers would be found in darkened crawlspaces where they had walled themselves up to escape some unspeakable horror. These poor reprobates were inevitably farmed off to Dunnes Stores or Crazy Prices where their thousand yard stare and hoarse broken voices would not cause eyebrows to be raised. One even became assistant manager of Texas Homecare out on the Longmile road. Until that is they found him one evening, naked covered in Dulux Weathershield trying to blow the place up with bags of Shamrock fertiliser and bottles of Baby Bio. It was back to Crazy Prices for him after that.
But here he was now at the door to the mentalists ward. The Gurrier opened the door and stepped into the darkness beyond. The interior of the room was dark, pitch dark. He couldn’t see his hand in front of his face. ‘Where the fuck is the light switch in here!’ The Gurrier scrabbled at the wall feeling for the switch. He thought he heard a tittering sound out in the darkness of the void. ‘Hehehehheeheheheheehehehee’ ‘Who’s there?’ Something wet brushed against his face. Jesus something was out there. But the Gurrier knew these walls of old. He’d been dragged here screaming and biting when he was six years old. His appendix had burst like an overripe melon and having being banned from Our Ladys Crumlin since he was four there was no choice but off to James and the big peoples hospital. The young Gurrier spent five days in the air ducts before they finally coaxed him down with Guinness biscuits and threats of violence. No he knew this place of old. He had seen things, things no man or boy should ever see. He knew why those poor fellas wanted to nail their eyelids shut. But this, this was not the terror of old that made him wake screaming and weeping in the night. This was mentalists in the dark flinging wet teabags about like fecking eejits. He’d show these fuckers. He was ready for the likes of them. There was a scream and the darkness surrounding the Gurrier flared with light as the stun baton crackled into life. A pyjama clad figure fell back clutching his face, teapot falling from nerveless fingers. ‘That’s right’ roared the Gurrier, holding the baton aloft and stepping forward into the corona of coruscating light it gave off, throwing mad dancing shadows onto the walls. ‘Yes you fuckers, I’m back. Remember me? Hmm?’ He advanced menacingly sweeping the baton of angry electricity before him. The figures at the edge of the circle of light fell back howling and cursing. ‘Where is he? Where’s that bastard? You know who I mean. That perverted fucker where is he?’ He booted the fallen teapot savagely into the crowd of shadowy figures. Turning he flicked the lightswitch and flooded the room with bleak institutional light. The effect was startling. Screaming for their mammies the demented victims of Lynch fled to the safety of their beds. Here they stayed, peering at him from beneath fetid blankets muttering the occasional oath.
The Gurrier considered using the baton on each of them in turn until they gave up the whereabouts of his quarry. However he had little time left and his trusty baton of truth was almost out of juice. What is more he may have need of it again before the night was over. He spotted one of the crazies lurking at the rear of the dormitory. Judging by his shifty appearance and the scorch marks running up the side of his skull he was the teapot bearer. The Gurrier grinned and advanced. ‘Where is he? Where’s the big fella eh?’ The mentalist shrank back staring fearfully at the baton but not before his eyes flicked to the door at the rear of the room. The Gurrier spotted the involuntary giveaway. ‘Ah his own private apartments. I might have guessed.’ Pushing past he approached the door. The mentalist screamed in protest and became lucid for a moment. ‘No, no he doesn’t want to be disturbed. He doesn’t like that, oh no. He mustn’t be disturbed when he’s with his ladies.’ The Gurrier turned, incredulous ‘He has women in there with him?’ ‘Oh no, ladies is tens and twenties. He likes his tens and twenties’ The inmate held up a handful of paper scraps. The Gurrier took one. It looked like a crudely drawn banknote. A dark pool of fear crept slowly into the Gurriers stomach. ‘What exactly does he do with these,ladies’ The inmate backed away from the Gurrier with fear in his eyes, his head shaking wildly. ‘No, no, no I didn’t see, I didn’t see, I’m a good boy Daddy, I’m a good boy!’ He turned and fled from the room.
The Gurrier sighed and turned to face the door. Another door another nightmare, best get on with it. It opened easily and silently. The room beyond was swathed in darkness as the room before that had been. Nightmares like the dark. It helps them breed. It was not silent in there. There was something in there and it was muttering quietly to itself. ‘Come on, c’mon, c’mon c’mon, c’mon! Come on, c’mon, c’mon c’mon, c’mon!’ The voice was low, guttural, the conversation interspersed with grunts of an indeterminate nature. The Gurrier slammed the lights on and brought the baton back to crackling life. The scene that confronted him was not good. The room was littered with home made ‘money’ on the floors, on the walls, the windows even the ceiling. In the corner the bulk of the Unfortunate O’Lónain sat, his back to the Gurrier, lost in the contemplation of his useless scraps of paper. ‘Hello ladies, come on, c’mon, c’mon c’mon, c’mon. Let me make it all better.’ Something was wrong, something wrong was happening in the corner of that room, something the Gurrier fervently did not wish to identify. He clearly hadn’t noticed the light being switched on, perhaps if he cleared his throat loudly. But no, the appalling acts continued without abating. The Gurrier sighed inwardly. ‘There goes another year of therapy,’ he thought. Then he electrocuted the fat bastard.
The screams went on for a long time. When he was finished the Gurrier threw away the useless baton and went for a lie down. After that he started to ask questions. O’Lónain had wrapped himself in a filthy blanket and was cowering in the corner of the room. The Gurrier was tired, the night was not going well he decided to go straight for the jugular. ‘What happened between you and Lynch? What happened before he left.’ O’Lónain goggled at him, he choked and spluttered. He held up the greasy tenners ‘l..l..l,adies, have s..s..some of O’Lónain’s.l.l.ladies’ The Gurrier feared he may have been too harsh in his treatment. It looked like the poor fucker was a vegetable. But a mental image of the fat man returned, hunched over in that corner rubbing his mickey with wads of ‘ladies’ and he nearly puked. The evil fucker knew what he was doing alright. God he didn’t have the stomach for this kind of degradation. This was Kesey’s department. He loved this kind of stuff. Suddenly a low howl came from the lump to his left. The Gurrier looked up and saw O’Lónain pointing at the TV in the corner gaping and moaning gently. The TV, held in a mentalist proof cage in the corner was displaying the evening news. There was something, the sound was off, disturbances in the city centre. O’Connell street cordoned off, fires, people running panicked. The Gurriers blood froze, it was happening again. O’Lónain moaned again and slumped over catatonic. The Gurrier stooped over him and whispered in his ear. ‘Yes that’s right Lenny. He’s back. Lynch has come home’ At the mention of the name O’Lónain sat bolt upright a look of terror no taser could ever instil crossed his chubby features. ‘Aaaahsssh, the ladiessss!’ a strangled cry emerged from the stricken madman. Frantically he began gathering the wads of ‘ladies’ in handfuls and armfuls shoving them desperately into his gob. Chewing frantically and sobbing to himself. The Gurrier backed away slowly and turned fleeing in terror from the horrible vista of this former captain of industry masticating in his own filth.
But there was more terror to face. It was too late now. Lynch was home. It was time to enter the filthy city.
O’Connell street the heart of the Filthy City. The Gurrier slipped through the Garda cordons and approached the end of his pursuit. The street was shrouded in thick black smoke, someone had set Supermacs alight. It crackled and fizzled as the fat ovens went up. The Gurrier thought he saw movement through the haze. The street was littered with broken glass and rubble. He picked his way past the rubble and burning car wrecks towards the source of the movement. The chill wind of the evening returned and for a moment the pall of smoke was lifted. Out of the distance Lynch strode into view. The Gurrier stood his ground and surveyed his ‘friend’. It was Lynch alright, no doubt about but there were changes. The Orient had exacted a terrible price on the Butcher of Parkgate street. Lynch was stripped to the waist his face smeared with soot but the eyes, the eyes were the same. Those mad oscillating pinballs of rage still burned like coals in their sockets. The Gurrier knew those eyes anywhere, the mentallers in James knew those eyes, O’Lónain knew those eyes. They were scary.
It was then the Gurrier noticed the others. From out of the miasma of smog small figures were emerging to stand by Lynch. The Gurrier blanched. Lynch had brought midgets with him from out of the east. Midgets the Gurrier’s nemesis! Little Japanese fellas with beards and knives. Kesey had never thought of such devilment. The Gurrier hated those little bastards. He feared them, they were so small, and deadly. He braced himself for the attack but to his surprise the midgets ignored him as did Lynch. Lynch was swinging a massive pickaxe onto his shoulder and shouting instructions to the midgets. The Gurrier approached cautiously. The whole group of them feverishly attacking Abbey street with pickaxes and shovels. Lynch his torso covered in strange tattoos was smashing dementedly at the tarmac. The Gurrier could just make out the strange designs, it looked like some kind of a map, a subway map? He could see the stops clearly, the train lines marked out, Omotesando, Meguro, Motoyawata, it was the Toykyo rail network. The Gurrier realised they weren’t vandalising the road, they were digging up the bleeding Luas tracks! Lynch turned to him, his face twisted in rage and exertion. ‘Not convenient! It’s all so fucking inconvenient!’ He pointed to the roadworks rubble that had been dumped all over the city centre forever. ‘Follow the map. Shinkansen! Funabashi! Get the dynamite’ Two of the midgets detached themselves from the work crew and disappeared into the darkness. ‘We’ll make it convenient again, so convenient yes?’
The Gurrier faltered my God they were going to blow up the fucking Luas and god knows what else. Lynch had gone mad out there. Faced with returning to this mess after all that efficiency he’d lost it. These mad ninja midgets with train stations for names were the result. Driving captains of industry to madness was one thing but detonating high explosives within the city limits was an outrage even that spineless lot in Leinster house would be hard pushed to avoid. This was trouble the Gurrier did not need. Even Kesey only used the really powerful stuff out beyond Tallaght. Maybe he could reason with him. ‘Now I know you’re upset Lynch but perhaps we could come to an arrangement? How about just the Motor Tax Office? We could put that down to an act of god something like that. How about it then?’ Lynch stared right through him for a moment. Then curled his clawed hands and pointed up O’Connell street towards the Spire. ‘That pointy yoke is next. We’re going to rip it out, shove it up Berties arse and roast him like a rabid monkey. Then we’re going to get everything running nice and convenient around here just the way I like it.’
The Gurrier’s mind raced. He couldn’t take them all on, Christ knew what those midgets were capable of. His stun baton was long gone that only left his mace and a moist towelette. Maybe if he could take out Lynch the midgets would fear him. Mace it was then. Clutching the can he prepared to meet his maker. ‘Is that,is that a moist towelette?’ Lynch had a strange wistful look on his face. He took the towellette and held it reverently. ‘How,how convenient’ The Gurrier clutched at this new madness ‘Yes, yes, they er have them everywhere now. Even..even on the Luas’ He held his breath. Lynch seemed suddenly bereft, lost, his mission of convenience through mass destruction suddenly derailed. ‘Maybe,maybe I’ve been away too long, maybe things have changed. Change can be good.’ He looked sharply at the Gurrier those terrifying eyes blazing into him ‘You wouldn’t lie would you Murphy. Would you?’ The Gurrier bit his lip ‘No no you take it home I have plenty more. Why don’t you go home have a nice cup of tea and sleep off that jetlag. We’ll talk in the morning and I’ll take you out to see the wonder of the M50.’ By morning Lynch would be in a crate enroute to Afghanistan and his ninja midgets would be turned over to the gougers in Darndale for target practice. Things were looking up. Lynch took another hard look at the Gurrier and called off the midgets. Striding away he mounted a sled and was drawn away by the midget gang over the Liffey disappearing at last from the Gurriers view heading down D’Olier street.
The Gurrier heaved a massive sigh of relief and headed across the bridge to his favourite watering hole. Once again the city was safe from his unhinged acquaintances. He felt a pint to celebrate was not out of the question before he made arrangements for Lynch to be shanghaied as an exhibit in the Kabul Zoo. Entering the venerable establishment he made the time honoured gestures and observed the satisfying ritual and craft of the barman.
The pint is drawn, the Gurrier lifts it slowly to quaff the dark goodness held within. It never reaches his parched lips. A scream, a terrifying bowel splintering shriek of primal rage tears through the heavens. Grown men begin weeping and wet themselves with terror. The Gurrier freezes, the dark brew crashes to the floor from nerveless fingers. A strangled cry emits from his stricken jaws. ‘Oh God and baby Jesus!’, Harcourt street. He’d forgotten fucking Harcourt street! There is movement at the door. The midgets eyes glitter in the darkness. Their beards pregnant with malice. They finger their devil knives. The Gurrier gazes in fear at his miniature nemeses, he whispers to himself, ‘Oh no, not again.’