Quirke Omnibus by Banville John (Benjamin Black)

Author:Banville John (Benjamin Black) [Banville John (Benjamin Black)]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan UK
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Quirke was dreaming that there was a fire. He was in a tiny room inside what he knew was a large house. It was night-time and there was a window that looked out on a broad, deserted street where the streetlamps were making a dull gleam on the tarmac. He could see no sign of flames yet he knew that there was a conflagration somewhere very close by. A fire engine was on the way, or was here, indeed, was under the very window where he stood peering out, although he could not see it, either, in spite of the fact that its bell was ringing so loudly and so insistently that it seemed it must be in the room with him. He felt frightened, or at least felt that he should be frightened, because he was in grave danger, for all that there was no sign of the fire. Then he saw a dog loping along the street, and someone running after it. The two figures, the dog and its owner, seemed not to be fleeing, as he felt they should be, on the contrary seemed to be happily playing a game, a game of chase, perhaps. They came closer, and he saw that the one in pursuit was a girl, or a young woman. She was carrying something in one hand, he could see it fluttering madly as she ran; it was a paper, or a parchment, with scalloped edges, and it was on fire at one corner, he could see the flame blown back by the air rushing against it, and he knew that the girl or young woman was trying to put it out, and although she was having no success she was laughing, as if there were no danger, no danger at all.

It was the telephone. He struggled out of sleep, rising off his side and flailing one arm wildly to find the machine and stop the awful noise. He found the switch of the bedside lamp. It always seemed to him a ringing telephone should be hopping, but there it sat on the little locker by the bed, quite motionless, squat as a frog, yet making such a racket. He snatched up the receiver.

‘I know, I know,’ Hackett’s voice said, ‘I know it’s late, and you were asleep. But I thought you’d want me to call you.’

Quirke was sitting on the side of the bed now, rubbing at his eyes. ‘Where are you?’ he asked. ‘What’s going on?’

‘I’m in a phone box, in Baggot Street. I was down on Haddington Road—’

‘What? Why were you there? What’s happened?’

‘Nothing, nothing. I went round to have a look, after what you told me about your daughter, thinking she’d seen someone in the street.’

Quirke could not take it in. ‘You went to Haddington Road, tonight?’

‘Aye. It’s a grand night, and I took a stroll.’

Quirke looked to the bedroom window, rimed outside with frost. ‘You realise,’ he said, ‘it’s—what time is it?’

‘It’s late, it’s late. Anyway, I went and had a look.

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