And so things went for almost a century. Sir Arthur ran the Dublin Office of Special Investigators, allegedly under the auspices and jurisdiction of the Crown, but was independent in all practical terms. He was fair in his judgments and efficient in his operations and most importantly discreet, so the powers-that-be were happy to let him run things in his own way. During this time, locals that knew of the department’s existence often referred to it as “The Fifth Court”.
The matter of Irish Independence caused some trepidation among everyone involved. The British government at the time was hesitant to lose such a long-serving public servant, but unsure of the consequences of recalling him to London, while the newly-formed Irish government was reluctant to leave someone they considered an English aristocrat in charge of such a secretive department in the heart of the city; especially a government department that was not mentioned anywhere in their newly-written constitution.
In December of 1937, two weeks before the constitution came into effect, the President of the Executive Council, Éamon de Valera, visited Sir Arthur. He arrived at midnight and the two cloistered themselves downstairs in Sir Arthur’s library. No minutes were kept of their meeting and neither of them ever spoke about what they discussed that night, but the conversation lasted almost until dawn.
When de Valera left in the morning, he called a special meeting of the Executive Council. No minutes were kept of that session either, but testimony from those present was unanimous in describing the zeal with which de Valera argued in favour of keeping the Office of Special Investigators and its Magistrate in place.
We arrived at Clancy Trucking twenty minutes later. It had gone past 6pm, but there were still cars outside and apparent movement inside. As I got out, the Containment van pulled in behind us. I signalled to Murtagh to cover the gate then turned and went inside.
The reason for the late activity was apparent once I entered. The damaged side of Matt’s office had been removed, and a new one was being lifted into place on cables. I recognised a few cousins working the pulleys.
I glanced about to make sure everyone was present. Matt stood in the open office above, waiting to haul in the wall and fix it into place. Robin was beside him and Tommy and James were in the crowd of warehouse workers below. Nobody wore glamours. All activity stopped as Cormac and I approached. It felt like catching a collection of statues in the act of moving when they thought nobody was looking.
“Gentlemen!” I announced loudly. “Sorry to interrupt. But I’ll only be a few minutes. Then you can get back to undoing the damage from my last visit. Matt? Robin? If you could come down here a moment?”
As they descended the steps, the other warehouse workers ceased their work and almost casually drifted to different parts of the floor. A more suspicious person than me would have said they were surrounding us.
“The last time I was here, things ended badly,” I told Matt as he reached the foot of the metal stairs. “I’ll try to avoid that now by being as straight-forward and honest as I can. Tommy has been running his own smuggling side-job for the last few years. Buying stolen cigarettes and alcohol north of the border and running it south to the White Clan.”
Tommy took a step towards me but stopped when Matt put out a hand.
“He stopped about six months ago,” I said. “Not through his choice, though. The White Clan found someone else.” I turned to James. “You married into the Reds about six months ago, yes?”
James nodded uncertainly.
“Big wedding, I hear. Both clans there?”
He nodded again, with a look of nervousness in his eyes.
“Seems your family took the opportunity to make some new business connections. They found someone willing to undercut Tommy. You made six grand a trip, right?” I asked Tommy.
“I did,” said Tommy carefully avoiding his father’s glare, “before they stopped calling.”
“And how much do you charge them?” I asked Robin.
Robin sputtered incredulously. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Three grand? Four? Even factoring in fuel costs, that’s a pretty decent profit. And then, last week, you stumbled over the crime scene and found a hundred times that amount. I can’t imagine how that must have felt.”
“I- I- I didn’t. This is bullshit!” Robin yelled, taking a step backwards.
“You know where Tommy keeps the GPS key. I bet it’s also where he keeps his glamour. Am I right?”
Tommy nodded. “A gym-bag in the bottom of my locker here, yeah.”
“Robin borrowed the glamour today," I told Tommy. "Some White Clan guys jumped Cormac and I, locked us into chairs and took Cormac’s ring of trueseeing. Then someone wearing your glamour walked in. I suspect the plan was to make some threats or promises or to offer to cut us into the money. Then they would give us time to think about it, in the hope we’d run out of there and come arrest you once we had backup. But I got out of the chair and punched the guy in the neck before his monologue and messed up the whole scheme. If that was you, you’d be insane to come back here and act like nothing had happened. And I learned a lot during the fight.”
Matt said, “What do you mean?”
“I swung a chair at his head and only grazed it. I punched him in the neck, yet my knuckles stung like I’d hit cheekbone. I grabbed at a knee but only caught a handful of air. It was someone wearing a glamour enchanted for someone else; someone a lot taller than them.”
“When did this all happen?” asked Matt.
“Within the last hour,” said Cormac.
I turned to take in everyone on the warehouse floor. “Hands up who has been here for the last two hours?” One by one, everyone but Robin raised their hands.
“I went on a coffee run!” said Robin, as all eyes in the room turned his way.
“No, you went to frame Tommy,” I said. “But it all went wrong, and you panicked and raced back here to put the glamour back and hope we’d believe it was him anyway.”
“This was a coup?!” said Tommy, angrily turning towards him. “You want me arrested? You think Matt will make you heir to this place just because you help run it? You’re his fucking secretary!”
Before he could advance further, Matt stepped between them. He towered over Robin. “Was that the plan? Take my son out of the picture so you could move up?”
Robin sobbed. “No. I was just trying to throw him,” he gestured at me angrily, “off my trail long enough to get out of this damn place. That money is enough for a truck of my own and a house in England. I could be independent. In every fucking sense of the word. I’m sick of needing your permission every time I want to take a shite.” As he spoke, his courage returned and he poked my uncle in the chest with each syllable.
Matt did not react. “Grey,” was all he said. Everyone turned to look at me, except Matt who had not broken eye contact with Robin. “You’re Grey now. Out of the clan. You and your wife and your kids. Fuck off to England if you want, but you’ll not be welcome anywhere in our lands again.” Heads swivelled back just as jaws dropped.
Robin deflated. “But it wasn’t personal. I just had the chance to make some money…”
“You sold out a family member for it. Or tried to. Get the fuck off my property. Maybe the Whites will take you in.” Then he climbed back up the stairs to his office. When he reached the top, he turned to the assembled crowd and added, “I want this wall in place in the next twenty fucking minutes.”
The warehouse staff leaped to activity, as Cormac and I took an elbow of Robin each and slowly steered him towards the exit. He walked as if in a daze.
“What happens now?” he asked eventually, as we emerged outside.
“Well, the original amnesty stands,” I said. “If you still have the money, and return it all, there’ll be no charges filed for that.”
He nodded dumbly.
“But there’s the whole ‘attempted kidnapping’ thing.” I added. “You’ll be looking at a few years for that. You might shave a bit off if you can tell us the names of the others involved.”
He laughed sharply. “Not a chance. I’m no rat.”
“Think about your wife and kids.”
“I am. If I’m going away, I need them taken care of, and the Reds aren’t going to help with that, but the Whites…”
I stopped walking. “You’re going to try and join the White Clan? You think they’ll be grateful for you if you hold back their names? You know how dumb that is? You did all this to get away from a clan.”
He stared at me like I had suddenly started speaking Estonian. “I wanted to get away from Matt, but I didn’t want to leave the clan. You’ve gotta have roots.”
We turned him over to Containment then drove back to the office in silence.
Robin was given a legal aid solicitor to help him negotiate the terms of his forfeiture of the money. He told us its location and when Doran and Barrett returned to our offices the next morning we had already retrieved it.
“It’s all there?” Doran asked as he examined the duffel bag.
“Most of it,” I assured him. “He spent a little, presumably paying off some goons.”
“Goons?” Doran asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Goons. Punks. Strongarms.”
“Hoodlums!” said Cormac helpfully, from his desk.
“Yes, hoodlums. If the money is marked and shows up somewhere, let us know? I’ve a few things I’d like to discuss with them.”
“Like the location of my rings,” added Cormac. He’d be in a sulk since Robin told us his rings had been kept by the White Clan trolls. But it had not stopped him recruiting someone to help carry his desk back over to my side of the office.
I unzipped the bag, to show Doran. “Three hundred and eighty-two thousand and change. Close enough for government work.” I zipped it up again and he took the bag by both handles and lifted it off the desk.
“That’s a lot of money,” I said. “If you need an escort, I know a Containment officer who can provide protection for a piece of the action. She’s fight-foot-and-three-inches of unrestrained fury with a golf club.”
“We’ll be fine,” said Doran, and forced a smile. He shifted the bag to one hand so he could reach out to shake my hand and I accepted the gesture. It was another textbook handshake. I could picture in my head the diagrams he must have learned it from. He turned to leave and looked at Samantha Barrett, who had not moved to follow him.
“Gimme a minute,” she told him, and made a small shooing gesture with a hand she presumably didn’t think I could see. Doran shrugged and left for the lobby, struggling only slightly with the bag.
“I just wanted to thank you, personally,” she said to me. “The money went out on my authorization, and it could have been really bad for me if it hadn’t been found.”
“No problem at all,” I replied. “One department helps the other.”
“Well, I know it was personal for you.” She stepped a bit closer. “Let me buy you dinner or something. A proper thanks. I’d actually love to hear more about the O.S.I.. Most of what reaches us is nonsense and rumour.”
I heard the sudden clatter of Cormac’s stapler hitting the floor and the squeak of his chair moving. It took all my willpower not to look. “Sure. I mean…” my brain fumbled for words. “If you’re free some evening.”
She took out her wallet and started fishing for a business card. As she did, my resolve cracked and I glanced behind her, in the direction of Cormac, where he had climbed onto his chair. As I watched, he drummed his fists onto his desk, stuck out his jaw, and pursed his lips into in a pretty damn convincing gorilla impersonation.
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