The Dublin Office of His Majesty’s Special Investigators had four Resident Magistrates in its first ten years.
The first died within a week of arriving in Ireland. He was leaving for church on his first Sunday and was shot dead on his doorstep by a gang of Irish rebels. It was never clear if he was their intended target or if they mistook him for the house’s previous occupant - also a magistrate - who had hanged two of their members a year earlier.
The second Magistrate served for two years before a disagreement arose between him and a Colonel in the Royal Irish Regiment over a horse race. They would not or could not settle the dispute by sane methods so arranged to meet in the Phoenix Park for pistols at dawn, where and when the Magistrate was shot. He was rushed to a doctor, but died of his wounds two weeks later.
The third Magistrate stayed several years in the role, but was recalled to London following a scandal involving the wife of a prominent Whig.
The fourth Magistrate managed to avoid both bullets and scandals until he resigned his own post after eighteen months and returned himself to England. His resignation letter stated that “the land is ungovern’d and the people ungovernable” and wished “the devil’s own luck” to whomever took the job after him.
For some reason, Kim had taken to eating lunch at the same time as me over the last few weeks. It was irritating and even if I took mine earlier or later, she’d somehow find out and make her way to my table before I could get two bites into a sandwich. On Wednesday, she was prattling on about a band she was planning to go see that weekend while I tried to read the dailies, when I heard someone clearing their throat loudly.
I looked up to see Finlay standing over us. The small employee canteen was empty, but he loomed like a blond Frankenstein over Kim like she was in the last remaining seat. “Do you mind, Kim? I need to speak to Detective Grey.”
“Oh, no problem,” she said as she got to her feet and scrambled to gather up the empty sandwich wrapper and napkins. She even picked up mine. That was a new-ish development, and I had been torn between the desire to discourage this behaviour and the convenience of having someone clean up after me. “So, let me know about Friday, OK?” she said to me before leaving.
Finlay took her vacated seat. “What’s Friday?”
I shrugged. “I tuned out when she was explaining the difference between EDM and dubstep.” I closed the file I’d been reading and placed it on the table. “So, do you think I’m planning to murder the Magistrate?”
He glanced back over his shoulder, as if to make sure we were indeed alone and that the door was closed. “I never thought that. But the fae said a troll would do it, and I thought fae couldn’t lie.”
“Oh, they can lie. Trust me. But he wasn’t fae.” I craned my own neck to check the door, then gave a brief rundown of the parts of Buckley’s final debrief that Finlay had missed, and what I had learned since. He listened in contemplative silence.
When I was through, he leaned back in his chair. “Well, shit.”
I nodded. “Shit, indeed.”
“How many trolls has the Magistrate sentenced?”
“Since 1843? About two hundred. Twenty-two of those are alive and no longer in jail. Some of them only got short sentences or have been out for years. About five to eight have a reason to still be holding a grudge, I’d say.”
“You’ve done your research.”
“I finish work at six and don’t own a TV. What did you tell Murtagh?”
“Just confirmed what he told me you told him. I got to the cell and you were leaning over him. He said that a troll will bring about disaster.”
“You want to bring him in? Tell him everything?”
“If we do, he’ll go straight to the old man. Which may not be a bad idea. Sir Arthur’s a force, I hear. If anyone can defend himself from an attack, it’s a two-hundred-year-old vampire.”
“But if that’s true, he’d never be in danger at all,” I said. “I think we should tell him, but not just yet. I want to bring him something; not just the dying gasp of what might be a trickster fae that got under our skin, when all is said and done.”
“True,” said Finlay and added, and if there is a giant troll clan conspiracy against him, we should probably not tip them off that we know.”
“I’ll add ‘giant troll clan conspiracy’ to my list of potential suspects.” I stood. “If I shoot you my list of trolls who may have a grudge, can you run some of them down in your spare time? Check to see they’ve not joined an anti-vampire militia or whatever?”
“Sure. What you up to now?”
“I’ll send you the list by email. I’ve already been working my way down it, so start at the bottom and work your way up. Now, I gotta go investigate an unrelated giant troll clan conspiracy.”
When Cormac and I arrived at Clancy Trucking, the security guard waved us in then grabbed the barrier and swung it over to close the entrance. We parked and I realised how quiet everything seemed. “Looks like Matt shut the whole place down for us.”
Cormac peered about. “It certainly has that ‘closed for private party’ vibe.”
I got out of the car and turned a slow three hundred and sixty degrees. All of the trucks were parked along the side of the warehouse while the row of parking spaces along the fence, usually full with employee cars, held just five. I recognised Matt and Tommy’s cars from sight. The others presumably belonged to James, Robin, and the security guard who was now leaning on the closed barrier with his arms crossed, while he stared towards us and the warehouse.
Inside, our footsteps echoed around the boxes and racks of crates and pallets. We found Matt, Tommy, James and Robin waiting just below Matt’s office. Matt sat on a tall stack of pallets immediately beneath the window. For anyone else, I would say he was casually waiting for us to arrive, but the elevated position below his usual seat of power was no coincidence.
Robin and James shared a crate that had been placed beside it. They looked like two defendants sharing a dock beneath a judge’s watchful eye. Tommy leaned against the stack his father sat on, which I guess made him the bailiff in the procedures. None of them had their glamours on.
I stopped about ten feet before my uncle and swept my gaze over the assembled four before addressing Robin and James directly. “I don’t know how much Matt has told you and I’m sorry for all the cloak-and-dagger. We wanted to speak to each of you first, and run a few checks before coming fully clean with each of you. Matt assured us you’d co-operate but, well, we wouldn’t be cops if we weren’t suspicious bastards.” I tried a grin which only James returned. “But we believe that on Friday night, one of the three of you was in Dundalk. You stumbled on a crime scene and helped yourself to a bag full of cash. I don’t know why you were there, and the government doesn’t really care. Matt will tell you: There’ll be no charges pressed if the cash is returned intact.”
On hearing this, Robin exhaled heavily. Then he threw up his hands. “That’s it? Some larceny-by-finding? Jesus, you had us worried.”
“Do you want to tell us something?” Matt asked.
“What? No, wasn’t me. I was at the pub. James?”
James Ó’Báin seemed even more confused and panicked than the last time we spoke to him. “No! I didn’t leave the house.”
“What about Katie?” It was a long shot, but I had to ask. “Any chance she took the truck?”
He coughed in surprise. “Hardly. She can’t even drive a car that isn’t an automatic.”
I turned to Tommy but he spoke before I could say anything. “You’ve asked me and my answer hasn’t changed. I was a hundred miles away.”
Matt jumped down from the stack of pallets and everyone went silent.
“Lookit,” he began. “I know the standing orders here are to deny everything when the cops come knocking. And those orders stand. But this is an exception. If you found the money, speak up. You’ll be doing the Clan - you’d be doing me - a service.”
Robin, James and Tommy exchanged silent looks.
“Last chance,” said Matt, menacingly.
“Maybe not,” said Cormac, stepping forward for the first time. “Let’s give everyone, say, 24 hours. If you have the cash and don’t want to speak up for whatever reason, we’ll be happy to grant an amnesty. Drop it off anonymously to any Garda Station and say it’s for Micheál Doran at the DOCB or Samantha Barrett at the CAB. Or you can bring it to our offices at Conyngham Road. We can guarantee confidentiality if you’re worried about repercussions.” He started the speech with confidence but faltered towards the end as Matt’s gaze drilled into him, but I had to give him credit for making it all the way to the end.
“Obviously, Matt, our deal will still stand,” I added.
He glowered at me and then growled, “Upstairs. You too, skinny.”
He stomped up the metal staircase to his office and Cormac and I followed. Once we were inside, he slammed the door and rounded on Cormac. “I agreed to help because one of my trucks was involved. Someone in this company - in this Clan - is sneaking around behind my back and I need to know who. You can give them an amnesty from the law, but not from me. I need to know who’s lying to me.”
I interposed myself between the two. “Our priority is the return of the cash. Always has been. Your help is appreciated, but if we have to choose between recovering the money and helping you find which employee is running around in your trucks and maybe carrying out a side-venture out of your warehouse, we’re gonna choose the money.”
Matt poked me squarely in the chest with a finger. “If you’re not helping me, why the fuck should I help you?”
“We are helping you,” I snarled back. “Without us, you’d have regular Gards here with crowbars, cracking open every crate and turning every truck upside-down and shaking it.”
“I’d like to see them try.”
“You will,” I said. “Tomorrow. If the money’s not back in 24 hours, we’ll be here. With crowbars.”
I could feel Cormac’s hand on my arm as Matt said, “Your mother would be fucking ashamed to know she raised a cop.”
What happened next was a blur. I swung a fist at my uncle, but Matt ducked it easily. In addition to being tall and strong, it seems he was also fast. Cormac saw my punch and released a stasis charm in a panicked yell. A stasis charm is a quick-and-dirty spell designed to slow down and stop movement in a small area, but it only washed over us like a gentle breeze. Matt straightened with a punch of his own that caught me under the chin like a sledgehammer. I rocketed backwards into the wall that framed the window and kept on going. The plywood-and-foam offered small resistance and folded easily. I emerged into the warehouse, three floors up, surrounded by a cloud of papers and debris, which were slowed by the stasis charm so they were almost stationary. It must have looked really cool but I couldn’t tell because I crashed onto the stack of pallets below seconds later.
My hip hit the edge of the top pallet and I bounced and cartwheeled painfully onto the concrete floor. My senses began reporting in, but one at a time from the shock. I could taste blood in my mouth and hear footsteps around me. I looked up to see James standing a few feet away, staring upwards with an expression of fear on his face. I rolled over to see Matt, framed in the hole in his office wall. Around him, motionless in the air, hung sheets of paper from his tax returns as well as fragments of wood and shreds of insulation from the wall. He stared down impassively before turning and disappearing from view. Just as he did so, the stasis charm expired and the snowstorm of debris exploded outwards in a sudden flurry of movement.
We left shortly after that and returned to the office. My jaw, shoulder, and hip ached, and I knew from experience that Cormac’s healing cream would have no effect. Instead, I swallowed a handful of ibuprofen and contemplated taking up drinking again.
“What now?” asked Cormac. It was the first thing either of us had said since the warehouse.
I tested my jaw a few times before replying. “Now we wait for the phone to ring. Or for a big bag of money to be delivered to the door. Which should happen any… moment… now!”
I pointed at the door dramatically, just as the phone rang.
Cormac guffawed loudly, as I swore at the phone before answering it. “That would have been really cool if it had worked. Hello, Office of Special Investigations. Detective Grey speaking.”
The voice at the other end was muffled beyond recognition. “You the guy looking for a bag full of stolen money?”
“That’s me. There’s an amnesty, you know. If you have it, you don’t have to be anonymous.”
“I don’t have it, and I don’t know who does. But I know where they are right now.”
I grabbed a pen from a drawer and manoeuvred a notepad into position before setting my phone to speaker and beckoning to Cormac.
“Go ahead, I’m listening,” I told the phone.
“There’s an old farm off Dunbro Lane, near the airport,” said the voice. “The Mulcahy property; it’s abandoned. I don’t know who has the money, as I said, but I know they’re worried that it’s marked and traceable, so have been asking around for someone to swap out the bills for new ones. They’re meeting a friend of mine there soon to make the exchange.”
“And why are you telling us this? Why are you screwing up your friend’s deal?”
“I have my reasons,” said the voice before the call ended with a click.
“Well, isn’t that mysterious,” said Cormac.
“Very. How much do you trust a mysterious anonymous voice?”
“Not at all.”
“Me neither. We head there now, check the place over, have Containment on standby?”
“Sounds sensible. This could all be an elaborate trap.”
Of course, it was absolutely an elaborate trap.
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