Stolen Souls

50

HERKUS FOUND THE cab driver playing a quiz machine in a chip shop on the Antrim Road. The drive there had been quick now that the Christmas shoppers were deserting the city for their warm homes. Even so, Herkus’s patience had worn so thin it had almost disappeared. It wasn’t helped by the throbbing that developed behind his eyes.

Gordie Maxwell had said the driver’s name was Mackenzie, that he’d be recognizable by the crude UVF tattoo on the back of his hand.

When Mackenzie realized he was being watched, he turned to Herkus, raised his eyebrows, and said, “Jesus, Gordie said you were a big fucker. He wasn’t joking.”

Herkus took the envelope from his pocket and showed it to Mackenzie. “This man. Who is he?”

Mackenzie turned back to his game. “Gordie said there’d be a couple of quid in it for me.”

“Depend what you tell me,” Herkus said.

Mackenzie smirked. “And what I tell you depends on what the money’s like. Christmas costs an awful lot these days, and these is hard times and all.”

The pain scratched at the inside of Herkus’s skull. He cleared his throat. “I ask one time more. Who is he?”

Mackenzie faced him. “Listen, you Polish cunt, I’m not some hood you can fuck about. You ask anyone around here about me, they’ll tell you—”

Herkus punched him in the balls. Hard.

Mackenzie collapsed in a breathless red-faced heap.

The girl behind the counter squealed. Herkus pointed a scowl and a thick finger at her, and she became quiet and still.

He crouched down over Mackenzie, who lay in a fetal position, his hands cupping his groin.

“I am not Polish,” he said. “Now tell me who is this man.”

Mackenzie went to argue, but Herkus seized his face in one huge hand.

“I am bad mood,” he said. “Very tired. Don’t make fight with me or I hurt you very bad. You understand?”

Mackenzie nodded.

Herkus released his face from his grip. “Okay. So tell me.”

“All right,” Mackenzie said. “I don’t know for sure if it’s him or not, but there was this fella I used to pick up from some of Roscoe Patterson’s places. You know, where he runs the girls out of. He never used to say nothing, he was always quiet.

“One of the girls told me he never wanted to do nothing with them, he just wanted to talk to them about religion and stuff, you know, try to convert them. I never thought much of it. There’s some people’s just odd, like.

“Thing is, he always used to get me to drop him somewhere different. Always somewhere round the Cavehill Road, but never at the one place. Like he didn’t want me to know where he lived.”

Herkus pushed the envelope with the drawing into Mackenzie’s face. “This man? This is him?”

“I think so,” Mackenzie said. “Looks like him, anyway, with that scar and all. But this one time, I picked him up from somewhere out near Newtownards and brought him back to the Cavehill Road. The fare was like twelve pound or something, and he gave me the money and got out. But then after I drove off I sees, fuck, he only gave me a fiver and two ones.”

Mackenzie raised himself to a sitting position, keeping his knees apart so as to avoid aggravating his already tender groin.

“So I turned round to see if I could find the cheeky bastard,” he said. “I saw him cutting up an entryway to the next street over, one of them as faces onto the waste ground, and I caught up to him outside this house just as he was about to go inside. The way he looked at me when I called after him, I thought he was going to go for me. I swear to God, I thought, this fella’s a nut job.”

Herkus stood upright and hauled Mackenzie to his feet.

“Where is this house?” he asked.