The Devil I Know by Claire Kilroy

They have to be given three semi-Ds an a detached four-bed house gratis an for nothing.’ He rolled down the window and hawked out a gullier of spit. ‘The working man up to his bollocks in debt to live in a rabbit hutch an that shower in the proper houses breaking their holes laughing at him.’ He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
    ‘So don’t build rabbit hutches for the working man.’
    He shrugged. ‘Logistics. Only way to make it worth me while. An I’ve to push planning permission through before that poncey bill on design standards gets passed, because then it’ll be all dual aspect this an acoustic privacy that. Windows in kitchens an adequate storage, blah blah. There’ll be a few flash penthouses up top, obviously, but the rest a the units will be shoeboxes. I’m going to increase the population of Howth by an eighth overnight.’ This stated with pride, as if he personally were to sire each newcomer.
    ‘What about zoning?’
    ‘Don’t mind zoning.’
    This was what I was dealing with. ‘Dessie, the kind of population density you’re proposing is appropriate to a city-centre location, not a seaside suburb. You’ll never get permission for a series of eight-storey apartment blocks, never mind an hotel.’
    Hickey winked. ‘I know the very man. Here, open the glovebox.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘Lamb a God, just open it.’
    Inside was the site map. I took it out, and then frowned. ‘How can you build three semi-Ds?’
    ‘Wha?’
    ‘You can’t, by definition, build an odd number of semi- detached houses. They have to be built in pairs.’
    Hickey rolled his eyes, as if this were precisely the class of hair-splitting shite that he’d come to expect of me.
    ‘Besides,’ I said, ‘I already told you. We no longer own this land.’
    ‘I know that.’
    ‘So what do you want from me?’
    ‘I want you to lend me the money.’
    Had he heard about the hundred grand from M. Deauville? Impossible. I’d literally just cashed the cheque. Either way, it wasn’t enough. ‘You’re talking a seven-figure sum there, Dessie.’
    ‘I am.’
    I laughed. ‘What on earth makes you think I have that kind of money?’
    ‘Not you, ya thick. Your new bank.’
    ‘What new bank?’
    ‘Castle Holdings.’
    A clang of alarm down my spinal cord. ‘How do you know about Castle Holdings?’
    ‘There’s a bleedin sign nailed to your bleedin door.’ Hickey wheeled the truck around so that we were facing the length of the site and he switched the engine off. ‘An you’re the bleedin director. At least, that’s what it says in the Register a Companies. Amn’t I only after coming from there?’ An image of a dusty black ledger of sins, and my name entered into the debtor’s column. ‘There was a phone number,’ he continued, ‘a Dublin one, city centre. I rang it an nobody answered. But the ringtone was funny.’ He narrowed his eyes at me. ‘You know, like, foreign . As if me call was being diverted to some other country, like when you dial them computer helplines an end up talking to some gee-bag in Bombay. Something dodgy going on there, I says, seeing as the registered address a Castle Holdings is up the road. So anyway, there I was driving home when I seen you coming out a the bank. An I thought: here, that’s dodgy too, His Lordship doing business with the competition, an that’s when I copped that Castle Holdings isn’t an ordinary bank with local branches an that. No, it’s a commercial lender .’
    ‘Castle Holdings isn’t a bank.’
    Hickey shook his head. ‘Snot what I heard.’ He pulled a photocopy from his back pocket and began to read. ‘According to the Register a Companies, Castle Holdings is the treasury-management arm of a transnational corporation. Treasury-management arms of transnational corporations are permitted in Ireland to be licensed as banks. In the case of most group treasury and asset financing operations, the Financial Regulator has disapplied its powers of