The Scholar

by Dervla McTiernan

  Lucy squeezed her eyes shut, rubbed at her forehead with both hands. The baby had made her way across the room and was sitting at Cormac’s feet, pulling at his shoe laces.

  Cormac stood, picked up the little girl, who looked surprised but not wholly dissatisfied with the turn of events.

  ‘You’re not quite well, Lucy,’ he said gently. ‘I’ll say goodbye to your sister, and then we’ll head away, okay? We’ll come back and finish our chat another day.’

  He handed the baby to Moira Hanley, who looked at him as if he’d asked her to hold his dirty gym gear. Cormac indicated with a nod that Moira should stay with Lucy, then he headed off to the kitchen. He found Susan Armstrong in the process of bleach-cleaning the kitchen sink. Every other surface gleamed. She must have been here for a couple of weeks, if she’d come shortly after Rob Henderson’s arrest. It looked like she’d spent her time cleaning and scrubbing. Maybe she thought that with enough elbow grease she could rid the house of the stain of what had almost happened here.

  She turned at his greeting, looked unsurprised to see him, offered him a cup of tea which he accepted. He took a seat at the table at her invitation. She leaned on the back of a kitchen chair and looked down at him. The skin on her hands was dry and reddened.

  ‘She wasn’t much good to you, was she? Lucy never could see what Robert was really like.’

  ‘Has the doctor been to see her? Did he give her some tranquillisers? Valium, or something?’

  Susan looked taken aback for a moment, then resigned. ‘Not since I’ve been here. Did she tell you he’d been?’

  Cormac shook his head. ‘She didn’t tell me, and I didn’t ask. But she’s taken something.’

  Susan nodded grimly. ‘I should have thought … I knew she wasn’t right but I thought maybe it was the shock of everything. A long time ago she mentioned something about Rob taking her to the doctor, to get something to help with her anxiety, she said. I didn’t point out that she’d never suffered from anxiety before she met him, and that the best cure for what was wrong with her might be a Rob-ectomy.’

  ‘You don’t like him,’ Cormac said, stating the obvious in the hope that it would draw her out.

  ‘I think he’s the worst kind of shite. Rob wouldn’t be satisfied with you just running around after him, picking up his mess and shining his halo for him. He’s the type who’d expect you to thank him for the opportunity.’

  ‘I can’t interview her when she’s under the influence,’ Cormac said. ‘Do you think we could work something out where you keep an eye on her before the next appointment, make sure she doesn’t take anything?’

  Susan’s eyes darkened, and her face closed off. Her hands gripped the back of the chair. ‘Tell me something, detective. Are you shaping up to make my sister a suspect?’

  Cormac wasn’t sure of anything yet. Lucy Henderson had a neon sign with the word ‘victim’ flashing over her head, but underneath that beaten, fractured exterior there was another Lucy, and who that person was remained to be seen. Susan Armstrong was watching him, trying to read him. She struck him as bright, honest, tough. Better to have her as an ally than as an enemy.

  ‘What I know is that two weeks ago Rob Henderson set about killing his three children, probably Lucy, maybe himself. Lucy says she knew nothing about it, but she also claims that Rob is innocent, so her word isn’t that reliable right now. My job is to keep those children safe, and to do that I need to get to the truth.’

  ‘That’s not your job though, is it? Your job is to get Rob put away for a long time. It’s my job to keep the children safe. Isn’t that what I’m doing here, day and night, while my own children sit at home without me?’

  ‘Do you want him to come home?’ Cormac kept his voice low, calm. ‘Do you want Rob Henderson back in this house?’

  Face frozen, she shook her head. ‘That would never happen.’

  ‘If Rob is found to be mentally ill and incompetent to stand trial, he won’t go to prison, he’ll stay at the Central Mental Hospital in Dublin, where he’ll be treated. Treated, in the hope that that treatment will make him well. And if he’s well he’ll be released. What do you think are the chances that after a year, maybe a little longer, Rob Henderson will make a full recovery? And if that were to happen, if Rob were to knock on the front door a year from now, do you think Lucy would turn him away?’

  Susan’s hands had dropped from her hips, the fight went out of her shoulders.

  ‘I need your help to make sure that never happens.’

  Her chin came up. ‘I’m not going to help you build a case against my sister.’

  ‘I’m not asking you to. The best outcome would be for the children to be with Lucy, if she’s well enough to care for them. If it’s safe.’

  She nodded once, reluctantly.

  ‘I’ll arrange for another time to meet Lucy. Keep her off the tranquillisers the day we meet her. I can’t question her if she’s on something, and I can’t make her see the truth if she’s drugged up to her eyeballs either, all right?’

  Another nod, and Cormac decided to leave it at that for the time being. He said his goodbyes to Susan, gathered a resentful Moira Hanley from the living room, and left the house more aware than ever that this case wouldn’t wait for him to have time. It would have to be the priority investigation, whatever the political or personal pressure he felt to put the hit-and-run case to bed. Deeply occupied with his thoughts, he didn’t notice that Moira Hanley stayed silent all the way to the station.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Carrie had spent the entire weekend at home, the first time she’d managed that in something approaching two months. Ciarán had gotten up on Saturday morning and had left straight away for the golf course, barely waiting long enough to confirm that she would be home for the day. When she’d wandered downstairs herself half an hour later, it had come as a shock to realise what a state the house was in. Oh the basics were done all right, the dishwasher was clean, the counters more or less tidied off, but the whole place felt … unloved. Uncomfortable. The hall table was cluttered with old post, bits of toys, the girls’ school cardigans. The bread bin was empty, except for a mouldy croissant and a heel of bread. The laundry baskets were full. The house smelled stale.

  The girls had been delighted to see her, but their excitement just underlined how shit she’d been lately. They were so young still, only ten and five. Having their mother home on a Saturday morning should be the norm, not a treat. They had cereal for breakfast – there wasn’t much else in the cupboard – and then she brought them swimming. Miriam’s togs were frayed, she was overdue a new pair. All Carrie could think about, as the girls swam up and down in their roped off lanes, was how badly she was letting them down. She kept up a cheery chatter all the way home, then hid in her room for ten minutes and cried until it was out of her system.

  After that the weekend got a bit better. Her mind drifted to work more than once, bouncing back and forth between the Henderson case and the hit-and-run. Despite what she’d said to Reilly, it would be hard to let the Henderson case go, and the hit-and-run bothered her. If she hadn’t been so tired on Friday night, so worried about home and so pissed off with Brian Murphy, she might have pushed back harder when Cormac moved to stamp his authority all over the case. Emma Sweeney had lied about her working hours at the lab. It was possible that the lie meant nothing – the kind of stupid, reflexive lie many people told when they were questioned by the police – but equally it might mean that Emma had something to hide. In which case Cormac was surely the wrong person to be leading the investigation. She half-expected to get a call at any time – Brian Murphy would almost certainly pull Reilly off the case as soon as he heard the story. More than once Carrie thought about taking a drive into the station, to suss out progress, to try to step in if she was needed. But she was on such thin ice with Ciarán as it was. She knew she needed to sort her shit out, make a decision about her career, and have an honest conversation with him about where they were going. She sett
led for getting in a food shop, cleaning the bathrooms, cleaning the girls’ rooms with their almost enthusiastic assistance and cooking two decent family meals.

  When she pulled on her jacket and kissed the girls goodbye at 7 a.m. on Monday morning, she still hadn’t had the conversation, and Ciarán barely looked up to see her leave. The last thing she saw as she pulled the door closed behind her was the hall table, Friday’s clutter still intact, joined now by a half-drunk cup of tea she’d abandoned the day before.

  She made it to the station for 8.30. The first thing she did was check the preliminary forensics reports on the hit-and-run, on Emma Sweeney’s car and clothing. Nothing suspicious had been found and Carrie breathed a sigh of relief. She settled down to her own paperwork, and was interrupted by a call from the desk officer at 9 a.m.

  ‘I’ve a boy here. Name’s Paul. Says his sister’s missing.’

  ‘What age?’ Carrie asked.

  ‘Uh … I’ve not asked him. Maybe fourteen, fifteen like?’

  ‘I meant the sister.’ Gobshite.

  ‘Oh right, yeah. She’s eighteen, he says.’

  She told him to pass it to Cormac Reilly, then hung up. Tried to concentrate on her paperwork backlog, and not let her mind wander back to Reilly or his cases. Her conscience nagged at her. She turned the page on the statement transcript in front of her, tried to make herself give a shit about a string of burglaries on Circular Road.

  The phone rang again.

  ‘Can’t reach him. Just getting voicemail. Is there any chance you could … only the young fella’s getting a bit upset here.’

  ‘Right,’ Carrie said, swallowing her irritation. ‘I’ll be down.’

  She went first to the case room on the top floor, stuck her head in the door. Fisher and a few other uniforms were hard at work. Dave McCarthy was working on a cuppa and a crossword.

  ‘Where is he?’ she asked.

  Dave didn’t look up. ‘Haven’t seen him yet today,’ he said.

  ‘He’s out,’ Fisher offered. ‘Interview on the Henderson case.’

  Carrie thought briefly of the pile of paperwork that awaited her, suppressed a flare of irritation that Reilly was out on her case while she was picking up his bits and pieces. ‘There’s a kid downstairs, wants to report his sister missing.’ Every head in the room went up. Irritated, she chose the least experienced of them. ‘Mulcair, you’re with me.’ She didn’t wait for him to follow, just took the stairs down to the waiting area, where the boy was waiting. He was sitting on the plastic waiting room chair, wearing tracksuit bottoms, a pair of seen-better-days runners, and a fleece jumper. He had dark hair, and a thin, clever face, pale-skinned and freckled. His hands were tightly clasped in his lap, and one foot bounced continuously with nervous tension.

  ‘Paul?’

  He looked up, and the fear in his face was unmissable.

  Carrie introduced herself, finding that her irritation was melting away. Whatever else this boy was, he wasn’t a time waster. She led him down the corridor to a family room, had him take a seat, offered him something to drink, which he refused. When she sat, Mulcair took the seat to her left. The family meeting room was an interview room, tarted up in what was presumably an attempt to make it feel a bit friendlier, a bit less intimidating. It had an ageing couch and two armchairs. There was a sad-looking box of toys in the corner, suitable for a toddler, half of them broken.

  ‘Paul, you may not be aware that it is against the law for gardaí to interview a minor – that means anyone under the age of eighteen – without a parent or guardian being present. Is there someone we can call for you?’

  He shook his head. ‘But I’m not in trouble. I’m not a suspect for anything. I just want to report my sister missing.’ He looked from Carrie to the uniform and back, settled on Carrie. ‘I haven’t heard from her in a few days. Her phone’s turned off. She’s not answering emails. I went to her work, but she wasn’t there.’ He was flushed, holding back tears. ‘I’m nearly eighteen, okay? You can just talk to me.’

  He had a nice face, this boy. Honest. But he was nowhere near eighteen.

  ‘Tell me about your sister,’ Carrie said. She didn’t open a notebook, folded her hands in her lap.

  ‘My sister – her name’s Della – she lives in Galway. Has done for the last two years. She’s just normal, you know? Like, just a normal girl.’

  ‘Does she go to the university?’ ask Mulcair.

  Paul shook his head. ‘She’s a waitress.’ Confusion crossed his face. ‘I mean, but I went to the place she works, and they said they don’t know her. That she doesn’t work there.’ He looked from Carrie, to Fisher, and back, as if hoping that they had an explanation.

  ‘How long has Della been missing?’ Mulcair asked. ‘When was the last time you were in touch?’ Carrie could almost feel his nervousness as he asked the question, and she tried to remember if Mulcair had ever sat in on an interview before.

  ‘On Friday,’ Paul said promptly. He pulled a smartphone from his pocket. It was a new model, expensive. He woke the screen, turned it to them so they could see. ‘We use this app to talk, every day. The last time we talked was Friday. She was thinking about coming out for a visit on Saturday. And then that’s it, nothing.’

  ‘Friday to Monday is not a very long time really,’ Carrie said. ‘If Della’s only eighteen, you know, eighteen-year-old girls, they sometimes like to go a bit off-radar, get a bit of space.’

  Paul shook his head vehemently. ‘Della’s not like that. I know you’re not supposed to get on with your sister, but Della and I do. She’s my … she’s my best friend,’ he blurted, immediately looking mortified, but he kept talking, determination that they should hear him battling embarrassment and winning. ‘Della and I talk almost every day, and I’ve tried and tried calling her, texting her. She would never leave me to worry for no reason. Besides, I’ve been to her apartment.’

  ‘This morning?’

  The boy’s flush deepened. ‘I went yesterday evening. She wasn’t there, so I sat outside and waited for her. She didn’t come home, all night.’

  ‘You sat outside Della’s apartment all night?’ Carrie asked. ‘What about your mum and dad?’

  Paul looked at his hands, said nothing.

  ‘Okay, Paul,’ Carrie said. ‘Tell us again about going to Della’s work. You said they hadn’t seen her?’

  ‘They said she’d never worked there.’ The boy was blinking back tears, fear and confusion written all over his face. ‘But I know she did. She’s been working there for two years, she told me that. But she said never to go there or I’d get her in trouble. Said that because they serve alcohol if she was seen talking to someone under age on the premises her boss would get really angry and she’d be in trouble. She must have been lying, right?’ He looked so betrayed at the idea. His breathing came harder, all the fear he’d suppressed for the last few days let loose and running him ragged. ‘But I believed her. I didn’t want to get her in trouble, even when she stopped messaging I waited days and days. But in the end I had to go, didn’t I? And they said they’d never heard of a Della Lambert. I made them get the manager. They didn’t want to, but they did in the end. I even showed them all a picture of Della, but they all looked at me like I was crazy.’

  ‘Do you have a picture with you?’ Carrie asked.

  Paul flicked on the phone again, found a picture, showed it to Carrie. Della Lambert, sitting beside her brother on a dry-stone wall, matching goofy grins on their faces. She had a nice face, mousy brown hair to her shoulders; her smile said this is cheesy but I don’t care.

  ‘What about your parents, Paul?’ Carrie asked. ‘They’re not worried?’

  The boy opened his mouth, then stopped. ‘My mother said she might just need some space, that she can’t keep in touch with me all the time. Said something about Della growing up.’

  ‘You’re sure that Della hasn’t been in touch with anyone else in the family this week?’

  He shook his head vigorously.
‘No. We’ve got a little sister, Geraldine, but she’s got Down’s Syndrome, and she doesn’t like talking on the phone. So Della sees her just when she comes home.’

  ‘She doesn’t call your mum or dad? They don’t call her?’

  The answer was obviously no. He shrugged uncomfortably.

  That something wasn’t right at home was obvious. Carrie had worked enough domestic violence cases to see the signs of neglect in Paul’s clothes, which were too small and looked like they had had been put on dirty. Besides, you didn’t have to be a garda to know that if parents don’t react when a boy this young spends a night away without notice – despite Paul’s bravado he couldn’t be much more than fifteen – there’s a problem at home. She had Mulcair take Paul’s details, his home address, Della’s apartment.

  ‘Okay,’ Carrie said. ‘Rory here is going to drive you home now, and he’ll speak to your mum and dad.’ Paul shook his head immediately, opening his mouth to object, but Carrie spoke over him. ‘I will send someone to Della’s apartment right away. If she’s there I’ll get a call and I’ll be able to let you know, all right? But if she’s not there we can talk to your mum and dad about making a formal report. Confirm that Della hasn’t been in touch with them, so that I can get this moving officially. Do you understand?’

  ‘But I’m telling you, amn’t I? Della hasn’t called our parents. If she had I’d know about it.’ His face was miserable. Tearful. He looked very tired and very young.

  Carrie stood up. ‘Come on, Paul. Let us get you home.’

  He looked at her for a long moment. Finally he scrubbed the tears from his face with the sleeves of his jumper, then stood, looking away from her and shoving his hands deep into his trouser pockets.