When people didn’t respect him, Frank took it bad.

That bitch Dora, for instance. She didn’t show him respect. Telling him that the baby he’d thought for a minute was his had in fact been planted in her by that slimy little bastard Dickie Cole.

How was any man supposed to stand still for an insult like that?

How could anyone tolerate it?

‘Dora?’ He let himself into the flat and went from room to room, looking for the bitch.

Now he’d calmed down, perhaps they could find a way through this. Talk about it. She’d have to get rid of it, he’d said that last night, he vaguely remembered that much, and on waking this morning that still seemed like the best route to take.

Get rid of the thing, start again with a clean slate.

Because he quite liked Dora.

At any rate, he liked the looks he got out on the town when she was with him. A right glamour puss she was. And he looked like the big I-am, having a girl like her on his arm. He paused in the bedroom, grimacing. And then she’d had to go and do that to him. Upset him that way.

‘Dora!’

Now where the fuck was she?

She wasn’t in the flat. He went to the wardrobe, and – fuck! – all her clothes were gone.

‘Shit,’ he said, slamming the door closed.

Her suitcase – that cheap tatty little thing she’d brought from home long since, when he’d first taken her under his wing, was gone from on top of it.

Frank went over and sat on the bed, the wind knocked out of him.

She’d fucking left him. Cleared out.

Did the audacious mare actually think he was going to let that happen? Let it get all round town that he couldn’t keep his own girl under control? Have people sniggering in corners, saying she’d run out on him?

No way was that going to happen.

He left the flat and went down to the car, where Bruno Graves was sitting patiently behind the wheel. He looked up when Frank hammered on the driver’s side window. Then he wound it down.

‘Boss?’ he asked.

‘I just want one thing clear,’ said Frank. ‘You say a word about this to anyone, I’ll cut your fucking tongue out. We got that straight?’

Bruno stared at Frank. ‘About what?’

‘That bitch Dora. She’s gone.’

‘What you want me to do, boss?’

‘I want you to get out there and find her. And don’t bother bringing her back. Just tidy this away, OK? Shut the bitch down for good.’

33

William Maguire’s funeral was a solemn affair. There were the usual hymns sung, and there were flowers, but it was a tragic event. A young man, cut down in his prime. Mrs Susan Maguire was crying her eyes out all the way through, her husband choking back sobs on one side of her and Donny standing stony-faced on the other as the vicar droned his way through the ceremony.