Marius

by Laurence Todd

  The senior police officer on the scene was now the assistant chief constable of the county. I contacted Dorset police and was eventually connected up to him. I began by asking about the accident.

  “Nothing could’ve survived that incineration.” He had a very pronounced West Country burr to his voice, with ‘survived’ sounding like survoived. “The heat was still intense when we arrived. They incinerate bodies at a crematorium at a lesser temperature than this. Took ages to bring the blaze under control and cool it down. Road was closed for hours, it was.”

  “Did it look suspicious to you?”

  “What, this incident? No, I didn’t think so. It all pointed to a tragic accident, car somehow loses control and hits another vehicle the other side of the road. Blaze was made worse because there was a canister of butane gas in the caravan. Couldn’t happen now, there’s a central reservation and barriers along the A37.”

  “There were five casualties, I’m told.”

  “We think so. Forensics managed to establish that number from those bits of charred bodies we found.”

  “None could be positively identified, though, could they?”

  “That’s right. We couldn’t even find teeth for most of them.” He chuckled. “We discovered who these poor sods were from the registration on the cars. One couple, if I remember rightly, were on their way to catch a ferry, and the ferry company said two passengers booked on the late-night crossing didn’t show up. The other family came from London. The plates were just about legible, so we think we got the right people.”

  I thought about the situation. “So no DNA tests or post-mortems were conducted.”

  “That’s correct. We knew who the victims were, and it was obvious how they’d died. We didn’t see any need for a PM.”

  “Was there ever any doubt about this case? What I mean is, between you and me, off the record, was there ever any suspicion this wasn’t an accident?”

  “From the position of the cars, there’s no doubt they hit each other almost head-on. I’m pretty sure one car didn’t intentionally ram the other, so that tells me it was an accident. We were just very thankful no other cars were nearby when that blaze occurred.”

  “What happened to the remains of the bodies?”

  “Swept up and buried somewhere, probably all laid together in one mass grave someplace. I can find out where if you want.”

  I told him that wouldn’t be necessary and thanked him for his time.

  So it was a fact whoever was in the vehicles had died. What we didn’t know for certain was whether Cormac McGreely was one of the persons involved. The car was registered to him but, on its own, this didn’t prove anything.

  Marbutt had said there’d been no sightings of the McGreely family since that time. I went back to looking at the files. An inquiry had indeed been made by Dorset police concerning the whereabouts of the McGreely family, but reports said the family had left to go on holiday and hadn’t returned.

  I reread what was known or suspected about Cormac McGreely. In IRA circles, his was a name to be revered. Dennis Reagan, an IRA bomber who’d been shot dead just before Red Heaven’s attempt to place a bomb near the Albert Hall, was said to have learned his ignoble craft at the feet of Cormac McGreely. McGreely was a bomb-making specialist, and he was suspected of being the manufacturer of the mercury tilt switch bombs planted under the cars of two senior RUC officers, which’d detonated on a main road in Belfast, killing both men and bringing the surrounding areas to a standstill.

  McGreely had been sent to live with a family in London just after his father had been killed by the UVF. I looked up what was known about his time in the capital. I nearly fell from my seat when I saw who he’d stayed with. Charles Doyle.

  Doyle was another staunch republican, claiming to be a distant relative of one of the IRA men involved in the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin. He’d been said to be the IRA’s kingpin in London years back and was, despite being in his late sixties, still active in republican causes, often speaking at republican meetings. He’d moved to London in the mid-seventies after having been briefly interned during Operation Demetrius, but his belief in the rightness of his cause had never died. The dream of a united Ireland was still what motivated him, and he passionately believed in using whatever was necessary to achieve this. If that meant car bombs and dead soldiers, with innocent civilians being caught in the middle, so be it. With him, the ends justified the means.

  He’d been present during Bloody Sunday, or the bogside massacre, as it was known in republican circles, in 1972, and it’d increased his bitterness towards the British almost exponentially. The Good Friday agreement, for people like him, was a sell-out of historic proportions, and he’d never forgiven Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness for what he saw as an act of betrayal. He’d been arrested once, in 1981, after public disorder had broken out when he’d spoken at a public meeting in support of Bobby Sands and the other hunger strikers, but he’d been released without charge.

  He lived in a modest semi-detached house on a quiet road in North Kilburn. I’d been there before when I’d spoken to him about Dennis Reagan’s involvement with Red Heaven’s plot to bomb the Albert Hall. Not too long after, Reagan had turned up dead, and I’d often wondered if my action in talking to Doyle had been the catalyst for this. Not that I was heartbroken about the loss of Reagan. His death had probably saved many innocent lives, but was small recompense for those who’d already suffered and died from his actions.

  Doyle was working in his small front garden when I arrived, and he watched me intently as I parked, got out of my car and approached his house. He then put down his tools and walked into his house, leaving the front door open. I followed him in. He was in his front room, sitting by the table and gesturing to a chair. I sat. The side wall was lined with books, many of which were about Ireland and the IRA. There were posters of Bobby Sands and Jesus on his other wall, plus a framed copy of the Declaration of Irish Independence which had been read out at the post office in O’Connell Street by those involved in the Easter Rising.

  “You’re Special Branch, aren’t you? I’ve seen you before. Is this an official or unofficial visit this time?” His years in London had done little to soften his Irish brogue. He still sounded like he’d only just left Belfast.

  “Official.” I showed ID to confirm this. “I wanna talk to you about a couple of bombings in the past two days. You know about them, don’t you?”

  “Yes. I always listen to the news on Radio 4.”

  “Very commendable. You remember your ex-lodger Cormac McGreely?”

  “Why are you asking?” he asked politely.

  “Have you spoken to him recently?”

  “Cormac hasn’t spoken to anyone recently.” He smiled ironically. “He’s dead; died in a car accident about fifteen years ago. He and his family were burned to death.”

  “He boarded with you when his father was killed, didn’t he?”

  “Yes, he did,” he agreed. “Came here after some murdering Prot bastards shot his father. His mother was already dead, so he came to stay with me.”

  “Why you?”

  “Why not me?” He sounded defensive. “He had no other living relatives, and I was a close friend of the family. I’d known his father, Sean, many a long year. My wife, God bless her soul,” – he crossed himself – “and I raised him till he became a man.”

  “And then he went back to Ireland.”

  “He did just that, yes.”

  “Why’d he return there? He’d have been, what, twenty-three then? He’d lived in London over twelve years by that time.”

  “That’s true, but he wanted to return home, so off he went. He also had a girlfriend in Belfast, Sinead, and you know what young lads in love are like.” He smiled, sounding almost avuncular. But there was nothing at all avuncular about Charles Doyle.

  “When did you next see him after that?”

  “Oh, not for a number of years. Probably eight or nine years, sometime in 1997, I belie
ve, just after Blair’s election to office. He’d married Sinead and they’d had a child by the time I next saw him.”

  “His son John.”

  “That’s right.”

  “And he’d have been about, what, six or seven when his father died?”

  “About that age.” He nodded.

  I was quiet for a few moments whilst I looked around his room. The picture of Christ on the wall was at odds with Doyle’s refusal to condemn the taking of life. I knew he was a Roman Catholic, hence the picture, but the fifth commandment, Thou shalt not kill, was obviously one with no resonance for him. I fixed him with a firm stare.

  “We think the two bombs are the work of the IRA. Did you know that?” I challenged him.

  “I didn’t, no, but they’re not,” he immediately replied.

  “That’s not what the bomb squad says. They know more about IRA bombs than the IRA, and they say the bombs are the work of the Provos, or some dissident offshoot of it. Same design, same construction, same everything.”

  “Nobody over here even knows how to make a bomb any more, and there’s no desire for bombings. We’ve been sold out, sold down the river. A century of struggle, and for what, a pat on the back from the Unionists and a seat in Stormont?” he sneered. “It’s a tragedy our historic mission, reclaiming our land, has been sold out for political expediency. I’m just sitting back and waiting for the traitors to see what they think they’ve achieved turn to dust before their eyes, and then they’ll realise people like me and Cormac were right all along.” He nodded sagely. “You Brits will only ever leave our country when we force you out.”

  “So, you’re denying any IRA involvement in these two bombs?”

  “That’s right, I am.” He sounded definite and he held my stare, looking defiant.

  “I hope you’re right. If not, I’ll be back, and you and several others’ll be coming with me.”

  We both stood up at the same time. I thanked him for his time. He nodded but said nothing. I got into my car and drove away.

  In a strange way, I believed him, even if I’d take the word of a snake over Charles Doyle’s any day of the week. The look in his eyes as he’d denied the IRA’s involvement made me think he was telling the truth. Currently, we had no one on Special Branch files known to be active in IRA terrorism on the mainland, but not everyone had accepted the peace process and, amongst many IRA supporters, there was considerable residual bitterness at the armed struggle coming to an end. What Doyle had said could also just be the truth as he knew it to be. The fact he’d denied any IRA involvement didn’t mean the more dissident elements weren’t involved. Maybe things were happening and he knew nothing about them. It was certainly a possibility I wasn’t discounting.

  *

  There was a list of nine names of people on Special Branch files known to have been active in, or associated with people active in, the IRA in London around the time Cormac McGreely had supposedly perished, and I ran them all through the Branch database. One was dead and one was now living with family in the USA and hadn’t been back to the UK in the past five years. Of the others, one was now living in Lincolnshire, but the other six were still in London. I brought up their names and profiles.

  The most prominent was Eileen Reynolds. She was now the London-based correspondent of An Phoblacht, a republican monthly paper which generally promoted the left-wing republican view, though it had also supported the peace process. Other than a few controversial articles, she’d not been engaged in any known pro-IRA activity for some years. She’d been one of the few women rounded up during Operation Demetrius in 1971 but had been released without charge and, soon after, had relocated to London. Of the other five, four were still subscribers to An Phoblacht but, other than frequenting a pub in Kilburn known to be used by IRA sympathisers, there was nothing else on file concerning them.

  The last name, Drake Mahoney, was known to be an associate of, and regular visitor to, Charles Doyle. I knew the name. He’d been arrested along with Diarmuid Carty when Kevin O’Hanlon, someone who’d been helping to locate an address for me as a condition of his receiving lesser charges, had been found dead last year. Carty had been found guilty of manslaughter and was serving nine years in prison, but Mahoney had been acquitted after the jury had failed to reach a verdict concerning his degree of culpability.

  I decided he merited further investigation, and I’d spent quite some while reading his file closely and making some pertinent observations about him when my musings were interrupted by a text message on my iPhone reading Where is ya, McGraw? alongside a sad-looking emoji with a tear in one eye. I’d been so engrossed in reading I’d lost all track of time, and I was supposed to be meeting Taylor twenty minutes ago!

  Sally Taylor and I had been together since just after my previous relationship had ended, almost four months back. Actually, it’d probably be true to say that relationship had simply atrophied rather than died. Both of us had known for some while we’d just been going through the motions but, as neither of us wanted to upset the other, things had just drifted along for a couple of years or more. There’d been no animosity or ill-feeling; we’d stopped loving each other but we still liked each other, we’d parted amiably as friends, we’d given each other a warm parting hug and had been sincere in wishing each other well, and I didn’t doubt we’d send birthday and Christmas cards, but the truth was we just hadn’t worked hard enough at the relationship. Both of us had had demanding jobs involving long hours on duty, hers as a junior doctor at Charing Cross hospital and mine as a DS in Special Branch, and our points of contact had gradually become fewer and fewer. Four months ago she’d told me she was moving back to her hometown in Wiltshire to take up a senior position at a teaching hospital near Bath, a position she’d very much wanted and had lobbied extremely hard for, so she was happy about securing it. The news wasn’t a complete surprise and, as I wished her well, I knew her leaving didn’t bother me too much. If anything, I was relieved. And a week or so after she’d left, one Friday lunchtime, just after I’d interviewed Sally Taylor about a story she’d been involved with, Taylor had asked if I’d like to go out for a drink with her.

  Taylor’s a twenty-seven-year-old journalist on the London Evening Standard and we’d first met when I was investigating the violent death of a young London police officer, murdered outside Conway Hall, Holborn, where a rally in support of a candidate standing for the mayoralty of London was being held. She’d been covering the election campaign when I and a colleague, DS Roberts, had gone to talk to Qais Jaser, campaign organiser for Tory party candidate James Blatchford, about the meeting where the officer had died, and she’d enquired with Roberts and I as to why Special Branch was interested in the campaign.

  Our paths crossed again the day after and, this time, unprompted, she’d provided me with some very pertinent information on shady financial dealings by Blatchford, which she’d learnt from a senior member of his team. The first few times I’d spoken to her during the course of our investigations, it was evident she had an interest in me beyond the case, and she admitted later that she’d confided in me, even though she was technically breaching a confidence, not only because the information was germane to my investigation, but because she’d really been extremely attracted to me from the first time we’d met.

  For my part, I was aware she was an absolutely fascinating woman, and there was definitely an aura surrounding her. There was something about her I couldn’t explain but found very hard to ignore. I certainly liked her, and wanted to get to know her better, so I readily accepted her invite.

  What I’d not realised, though, was that I was on the cusp of experiencing the most amazing weekend and, afterwards, my life wouldn’t ever be the same again.

  We met for a drink after work later that same day, in a pub near Victoria station, and it had been so much fun; delightful, relaxed, and, midway through the evening, it struck me just how much I was enjoying being with her. Right from her opening question, “So, how long you been in
the police?” we talked so freely about anything and everything, and we connected on every level. My belief she was a fascinating woman was borne out several times over. There was so much more to her than I’d ever realised and there was something so natural, so easy about just being with her, and the three and a half hours we were together seemed like five minutes.

  That evening, however, something about her very essence seeped into my soul. I couldn’t explain it then, and can’t now, but, just being with Taylor, I’d felt alive in a way I’d never felt before, as though all my senses and feelings had suddenly come to life for the first time and I could see clearly; everything suddenly made sense. I’d wanted this feeling to continue, so, heart in my mouth, hoping I didn’t sound as nervous as I felt, this time I took the initiative and asked if I could see her again. She’d smiled warmly and said, “No need to be nervous, Robert, I really wanna see you again,” so I asked if she liked Chinese food. The next evening we went to Chinatown.

  I’d never enjoyed an evening so much before. We had a beautiful evening; a leisurely meal spread over a couple of hours, several drinks each, and we’d talked so easily and laughed so much, I was beginning to feel like I’d known her forever. At one point during the evening, she’d laughed at something I’d said and, as I watched her face light up, I felt my heart doing the kind of triple backflip somersault that’d qualify it to compete at the next Olympics. There was no doubt I was absolutely falling hard for her, and I think I knew at that point I’d never felt like this about any other woman I’d known. She told me a few weeks later that I was more than everything I thought you’d be, and that she’d fallen in love with me that evening.

  The evening had culminated in her inviting me back to her flat in Battersea. Leaving the restaurant, she held my hand all the way to the Charing Cross Road. In the taxi she’d sat right up close so our thighs were touching, linked arms and, for most of the ride, had her head on my shoulder. My stomach started churning over. Something was happening here.

  Barely inside the door of her flat, she’d immediately come on to me and planted on me the longest, the slowest and most intense kisses I’d ever experienced. Every nerve ending in my body had been electrified and she did things to every one of my senses I couldn’t even begin to explain or describe. We were kissing each other as though our continued existence depended on it and, somehow, we managed to make it as far as the couch. I’d ended up staying the night and, since then, apart from to do laundry and collect mail, I hadn’t been spending much time at my own place in Acton.