The Devil

15

I got back to me apartment.

Down,

depressed,

defeated.

Nietzsche wrote that ‘to shame a man is to kill him’.

No argument from me there.

I opened the door, it was close to nine in the evening. So OK, I stopped in a few places en route.

1. To erase the very chill he’d sunk in me bones.

2. The shock of the developed film had walloped me hard.

The smell hit me first.

Rank,

foul,

dead.

It literally knocked me back into the corridor.

Took a deep breath, gathered me shredded nerves, went in.

The whole apartment was lit up.

Blazing with candles.

Black candles.

Almost fifty at a rough estimate. On every surface.

On the coffee table was a dead dog.

Headless.

Gutted from end to end.

The entrails spilling on to the wooden floor.

Took me a moment to realize there was a note pinned to the poor animal’s hind quarters.

A very bloodied note. Read:

‘Dog-gone.’

And on the bookcase, a red card – and I mean crimson. With more than a little trepidation, I opened it. It seemed to be some kind of invitation. The words in black read:

Missa niger.

Invito te venire ad clandestinum ritum.

And it was signed, ‘The Devil’s Minion’.

The acid-thrower, not hiding the fact that he’d re-decorated my apartment. The bastard had balls, I’d give him that, and I swore,

‘You’ll fucking need them, pal.’

I stood, frozen, as I surveyed my home.

Then rage kicked in. Never underestimate the dark power, the energy of that. It galvanizes you, has you muttering,

‘By Jaysus.’

If there is a better antidote to terror, a sawn-off not being to hand, bring it on.

I grabbed the help that was on site.

Xanax,

Jameson,

and a primed and loaded gun.

Whoever had black candled my place hadn’t found the gun. It was wrapped in oilskin, under a pile of dirty laundry.

Burglars know that old ploy, but this intruder hadn’t come to steal.

Once the weapon was in me hand, I began to feel, if not better, at least less powerless. I gripped it like me first Holy Communion money. Then: double Jameson (neat), double Xanax (neater), and mused on the poor dog’s head.

Where would the sick fucker have put it, going for max effect as he was? Godfather like, in me bed?

I’d check that once the meds hit.

The fridge, of course.

On ice, so to speak.

I added another dollop of the Jay, me gut warming already and a ferocious anger building. The magic of prescription drugs, a frigging song began to roll in me head.

Now?

I’m standing in the centre of my apartment, with a headless dog, its entrails dripping still on to me floor, my system ablaze with whiskey and dope, my temper close to Delcon three, a loaded, primed weapon in my right hand, and I’m humming ‘The Boys Are Back In Town’?

Like on auto, this is followed by ‘Not A Dry Eye In The House’.

Maybe twenty minutes in, I ease my grip on the weapon. The butt is slick from sweat, my fingers aching from the pressure.

I find my mobile, call Stewart.

Takes a time, but eventually,

‘Lo?’

Jesus, now even ‘Hello’ is abbreviated?

‘Stewart, I need your help.’

Pause.

‘Er, Jack, this is not like…er…the best moment.’

Discretion never being me strongest suit and me not being in the best of tempers, I snapped,

‘What? It’s not like you’re getting laid or something.’

Whoops.

He said,

‘Actually…’

Christ, his date with the freaking vegan lawyer. He was scoring?

I could hear muttered whispering.

Pillow talk?

Like I’d know.

He asked,

‘Where are you?’

I nearly said, Iraq, why else would I call?

Went with,

‘Me apartment.’

‘OK, I’ll be there in, say, twenty.’

Clicked off.

What? No pithy Zen aphorism?

I slunk down against the wall, the bookcase to my right, my eyes locked on the still-open door.

The black candles threw macabre shadows dancing along the ceiling.

The gun was resting on the floor, a Hail Mary from my hand.

If anyone other than Stewart came calling, he’d better have made peace with his maker. It would be a real bad time for the Mormons to be house calling.

I’d never noticed before, but pinned to the side of the bookcase was:

God is in the most secret corner of your life,

Where no one reaches,

Where a voice which comes and goes mysteriously tells you

What you do not want to hear.

Recall what you would prefer to forget

And

What you do not want to know.

He is that profound abyss of

Your unbelief.

He is in that

Which you feel you have lost,

That you fear

You will not find again,

And which you wish to possess,

Although

You would be ashamed

To admit it

To other people.

Fuck, maybe the Mormons had been after all.

I nipped at the Jay to keep me focus sharp, me rage on fire, thought of Serena May and the golden child she’d been. And almost as outrider to her, Lee Ann Womack’s ‘I Hope You Dance’.

My mind like a cobra, lashing all over the place.

Time moved on. My cocktail of booze and pharmaceuticals had zoned me out. Languidly, I reached to the bookcase. Always wanted to be languid as opposed to langers. Using the Dice Man method of random selection, I’d see what spoke to me.

Seamus Smyth, his second great novel, Red Dock.

What the nuns did to the poor Magdalen girls, the Christian Brothers did to the boys, in the so termed ‘Industrial Schools’. Translate as ‘Concentration Camps’.

With total Church approval.

The opening lines had me spitting iron.

Stewart appeared in the doorway and I came as close to shooting him as I don’t want to dwell upon.

He was wearing a T-shirt with the logo ‘Above the saddle, no rider. Below the saddle, no rider.’

Was he fucking kidding me?

He stared in, disbelief writ neon, muttered in very un-Stewart fashion,

‘Holy shite.’

I said languidly,

‘Don’t be shy, come in. It gets, if not better, a whole lot more interesting.’

He advanced cautiously, as if something was going to bite him.

Well, he was safe enough from the dog, I reckoned.

His eyes remained on my gun till he saw the coffee table, and it looked like he was going to throw up.

Guess Zen didn’t cover that.

I asked,

‘Any thoughts on where a sick bollix would stash the head?’

He managed to compose himself, asked,

‘What the fuck happened?’

In nigh most of the years I’d known him, through

dope-dealer,

convict,

businessman,

Zen pain in the arse,

that’s if anyone ever knew him,

he never swore.

Perhaps he felt no need, but now he was effing and blinding like the rest of the country. Like a priest counting the takings after Sunday Mass.

I laid out the whole gig, even the pictures that hadn’t developed.

He seemed mesmerized by the array of black candles.

When I’d finished, I asked,

‘Is there a Zen message to explain this?’

He said

‘Shit happens.’