The Scholar

by Dervla McTiernan

  Emma drew a deep, shuddering breath. She was angry, he could see it, but she gave a short nod of acknowledgement. ‘Then I’m going to go to Dublin. See my mother. See Roisín.’

  ‘Emma …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’ll need to give a statement too. I’m sorry.’

  She looked like she wanted to slap him. ‘Fine,’ she said instead. ‘I’m going home. You tell them to call me. I’ll come in, I’ll give my statement, but I’m bringing Tom Collins with me. And as soon as it’s done I’m going to Dublin. If they want to talk to me again they can find me there.’

  ‘All right,’ Cormac said. He wanted to say more, but he was on uncertain ground.

  She walked to the door, paused. ‘I can’t believe he did it. I can’t believe he murdered those poor girls. I saw Della’s body.’ She stopped, swallowed against her tears. ‘I can’t believe you thought I could have done that.’

  ‘Emma, I …’ Cormac began, shaking his head.

  But she held out a hand to forestall him. ‘No,’ she said. The finality of the word seemed to strike her. ‘It’s going to take some time, that’s all.’ She opened the door.

  There were so many things Cormac wanted to tell her, so many things he should say, but it all seemed too big suddenly, the barrier between them insurmountable. Only one thing occurred to him and it was little enough to offer her. ‘Fisher asked me to tell you,’ Cormac said. ‘He never believed you could have been involved. It’s why he worked so hard to find the garage, I think.’

  Emma had her hand on the door handle, and her back was to him. She stopped when she heard his words, her head a little bowed. She nodded without turning, opened the door, and was gone.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  The team came back to the station, carrying with them the kind of energy generated by a successful operation. They spilled into the case room in a noisy, pat-on-the-back exchanging huddle, throwing jackets onto chairs, logging into computers and passing impressions back and forth. Carrie stood back from it all. They were releasing tension, but she felt hers ratcheting up a notch. They’d scored a goal, no doubt about it, but the match was far from over.

  ‘Dave, where’s the laptop?’ she asked.

  ‘Gone straight to technical,’ he said.

  ‘Go down there, will you?’ she asked. ‘Stand over them, make sure they’re on it and the moment they have anything at all give me a call.’

  Dave nodded and left the room. Galway had a small technical team, a couple of whom were good with computers. They were limited, though, and more challenging work had to be referred on to the specialist team in Dublin. If that was needed in this case, Carrie wanted the computer gone out of the station within the hour. They could hold Murtagh for twenty-four hours only without charging him.

  Carrie looked around for Fisher, didn’t see him. She turned to Moira. ‘Who’ve we got downstairs?’ she asked.

  Moira was all business. ‘Murtagh’s in room one,’ she said. ‘We’ve put the security guard in room three.’ The security guard had told them nothing at the scene, but he had priors for assault and Carrie had decided he was worth pushing. ‘There were only two other scientists in the lab,’ Moira continued. ‘One said he’d met Carline but had never heard of the Lambert girl. But there’s a woman – Emily Houghton. She said she’d met Della more than once, even worked side-by-side with her. We’ve brought her in too. She’s in room four.’

  ‘All right,’ Carrie said. ‘Good.’ She thought about updating Murphy. She’d half-expected him to appear in the case room as soon as they returned, armed with questions and looking for an update. But he’d given her some space and she should use that. Too much was in train.

  ‘Sergeant.’

  Carrie turned to see Peter Fisher, waiting for her attention. His face was taught, worried.

  ‘Yes?’ she said.

  ‘Murtagh’s lawyer has arrived,’ Fisher said.

  Carrie nodded, unsurprised. The lawyer had been there, at the scene.

  ‘His other lawyer,’ Fisher said. ‘Anne Brady’s just arrived downstairs.’

  The information didn’t go in. It didn’t make sense. Carrie was aware that she was staring back at Fisher, mouth half open, question unasked.

  Fisher nodded. ‘She says she’s here to defend him.’

  ‘Come on,’ Carrie said. ‘I want another look at her.’

  They got to the interview level just in time to see the back of Anne Brady’s head as she was led into the room, the door closing behind her. Carrie ducked quickly into the neighbouring observation room, Fisher on her heels, and they watched Brady’s introduction to her client through the oneway glass. The sound was switched off. The younger lawyer, her back to the mirror, half-stood in response to Brady’s words. Her body language suggested an objection. Murtagh looked surprised initially, then as the conversation went on more confident. He interjected, said something to the younger lawyer. Brady didn’t wait for the younger woman to react, just walked around her and placed her briefcase on the table, unlocked it. Rory Mulcair, who must have escorted her to the room, hovered uncertainly at the doorway.

  ‘We shouldn’t be in here,’ Carrie said, coming back to herself. ‘Come on.’ She led the way back into the corridor, then turned and set the electronic lock on the observation room door. Then she turned and watched as Mulcair escorted a pissed-off-looking young lawyer away down the corridor.

  ‘Christ.’ Carrie leaned back against the wall, rubbed her hands through her hair. She looked at Fisher, seeing an ally rather than a subordinate. The last few hours had brought them closer together. He’d stretched out his neck for Reilly and had brought them a win. ‘I’m out of my depth,’ she said. ‘I got this case about …’ She looked at her watch again. ‘I got it about seven hours ago. I have no clue why John Darcy would send his own lawyer to defend the man accused of murdering his granddaughter, and no clue as to how the hell he knew to send her now.’ She looked to Fisher for ideas, and he slowly shook his head.

  ‘I can’t go up against Brady when I have no idea what’s going on. She’ll eat me alive, and Murtagh will be walking out the door by the end of the day.’

  ‘She’s just a lawyer,’ Fisher said. ‘She can’t change the facts. Half of what we’ve heard about her must be bullshit anyway. Exaggerations.’

  ‘Only half?’ Carrie said.

  Fisher shrugged, and they lapsed into silence. Carrie let it sit for a moment. She was thinking, thinking, thinking. Eventually, she turned to Fisher.

  ‘I sent Dave to supervise the tech lads,’ she said. ‘Will you go and see what the update is? See if they’ve managed to get in yet?’

  Fisher nodded, hesitated, then left, looking backwards over his shoulder as he left. Carrie waited for a moment until she could be sure she was alone, then she took her mobile phone from her back pocket and dialled. He answered immediately.

  ‘Reilly,’ he said.

  ‘Cormac,’ she said. ‘I need you to come in. I need your help.’

  There was silence on the line for a moment. ‘I’m on leave.’

  ‘It’s just leave. Not a suspension.’ A technicality, but a useful one.

  ‘What’s going on, Carrie?’

  She’d thought about going to Murphy first, clearing it with him. But better to ask for forgiveness than permission. ‘Look, just come in, will you? Anne Brady is here. She’s defending Murtagh. We’ve got twenty-four hours and I’m not ready. I’m not likely to get ready in that time. Not Brady-ready, anyway. I need you here.’

  One more pause. One more hesitation. ‘I’m on my way.’

  They met outside the station and walked in together.

  ‘How is she?’ Carrie asked. ‘How’s Emma?’

  ‘She’s okay,’ Cormac said. She wasn’t, but he wasn’t going to talk about it.

  Carrie nodded, didn’t push, kept walking. He liked who she was. She was a good person, a good cop.

  ‘Did you get anywhere with the laptop?’ Cormac asked.

>   Carrie shook her head. ‘It’s encrypted. It’s gone to Dublin but it will take some time.’

  Shite. Another chance gone and with it the tension ratcheted up another notch. ‘Are you sure about this, Carrie? About bringing me in?’ he asked.

  She snorted, kept walking. Cormac followed. ‘You need to do the interview,’ she said. ‘I’ll be there with you but you need to run it. You know the case better than I do.’

  ‘All right,’ Cormac said. He felt the awkwardness of the moment. ‘But Fisher should be with me. You should take the obs room. If you’re with me, two sergeants for one interview, Brady will know something is up.’

  She didn’t hesitate. ‘Right. I’ll get set up, let Brady know we’re kicking off shortly. She asked for a pre-interview briefing …’ It was something lawyers sometimes asked for and which the gardaí were often willing to give. Briefing a solicitor pre-interview meant that the solicitor had time prior to the interview to advise their client. Sometimes it made for a more useful interview, avoiding the delays caused by multiple breaks.

  ‘Tell her no,’ Cormac said. ‘She’s getting nothing.’

  ‘Okay,’ Carrie said. ‘So what’s your plan?’

  ‘I have to find their common interest, the link between Murtagh and John Darcy, and fracture it.’

  ‘Do you know how you’re going to do that?’

  Cormac shrugged, smiled at her. ‘No,’ he said. ‘But I’m good in the room.’

  Cormac had sat in an interview room opposite Anne Brady only once before, when she’d defended an IRA bomb-maker, and that time he’d come off worse. This time he wouldn’t let that happen. Not just for Emma. Not just for Carline and Della. But for Fisher and Carrie too, who had so completely laid their trust in him. Fisher took the seat to his right, low key, notebook in hand, boy scout routine ready to go. Anne Brady’s cold blue eyes watched in silence as Cormac took his time setting up, settling his file just so, arranging, then rearranging the exact placement of his chair. Fisher readied the tape recorder, and gave the warning, and then he and Cormac sat, silent and waiting.

  After a moment of this the lawyer cleared her throat. ‘On my advice, my client will not be answering any more questions, unless you have a deal to put on the table.’

  Cormac didn’t look at Brady, but coolly, calmly, spoke directly to Murtagh. There was only one way to do this and that was to go all in.

  ‘There’ll be no deals for you, Professor Murtagh. You are going to spend whatever years you have left to you in prison. You murdered two young women in cold blood in order to hide a fraud you had been engaged in for years. A fraud you used to draw money and power to yourself. We have you, you see? We have everything we need to put you in jail for the rest of your life.’

  Cormac nodded to Fisher, who opened a file and started to read.

  ‘The garage attendant you met with in Northern Ireland has identified you in a photo line-up as the man he met with on the morning of the twenty-sixth. He’s given a statement that you claimed you had hit a deer, and that you paid extra for immediate work to be carried out. Scene of crime have taken your vehicle into our processing unit and they are stripping it back. They have already found traces of blood which have been sent for DNA testing.’

  Fisher turned a page, used his finger to trace downwards, found a place and spoke again. ‘Ania Kalinski works at the hotel at Harvey’s Point. She brought room service to your hotel room on Friday night, the twenty-fifth of April. Ania has given a statement. She tells us that she saw only Mrs Murtagh in the room. Your wife wasn’t feeling very well, Professor Murtagh. Ania had to help her back to bed. She explained to Ania that you’d been held up, but you’d called and asked her to order dinner for both of you, that you’d be there shortly.’

  ‘Your wife is being interviewed as we speak by our colleagues,’ Cormac said. ‘They are asking all about your weekend in Harvey’s Point. They’ll ask your wife what time you did show up at that Friday night. Will she tell the truth, do you think? I hope she tells the truth. It will be easier for her, in the end.’

  ‘And then there’s the laptop,’ Fisher said.

  ‘Yes,’ Cormac said. ‘The laptop.’ He let the silence draw out for a moment before speaking again. He kept his eyes on James Murtagh but his attention was all on Anne Brady. He hadn’t missed the fact that her laser focus had tightened even more at the mention of the computer. That was it. The reasons she was there. ‘Della Lambert had a brother, did you know that?’

  Murtagh’s eyes held his, tight, anxious. The man was shrinking, aging right there in front of them.

  ‘They were very close, Paul and Della. Paul was good enough to give us Della’s password.’ Cormac let his bluff sink in, saw the information hit Murtagh like a blow, then nodded slowly. ‘I think you know what we found.’ In his peripheral vision he saw Anne Brady’s lips thin. She cleared her throat.

  ‘Detective, I’ve recently been made aware that Della Lambert was an employee of Darcy Therapeutics in Galway. She was paid directly by Carline Darcy to carry out work for the company. That work is saved to the laptop you now hold and it is most sensitive. I must ask that no further examination of the laptop is undertaken until the contents have been cloned and that cloning has been validated by an appropriate expert. If you are not in a position to make that commitment to me now, I will be obliged to seek an immediate injunction to the same effect.’

  Murtagh shifted restlessly in his seat at Brady’s words.

  ‘An injunction,’ Cormac said.

  ‘Yes,’ said Brady. ‘The contents of the laptop are extremely valuable and they belong to the company. To be clear, I do not seek to prevent you from carrying out your investigation, merely to safeguard the contents while you do so.’

  Cormac looked from Murtagh to Brady and back again. This wasn’t about covering up a fraud. Something more was going on. Cormac let the silence spin out. The room smelled only of cleaning fluid, but the air felt tainted.

  ‘Tell me, Professor, when did Della Lambert discover that you had fabricated your test results?’

  Murtagh looked at him blankly.

  ‘Now’s the time, James,’ Cormac said. ‘This is your chance to tell us the truth of what happened. It’s not necessary. We already know what happened. I want to be clear – your cooperation will not change the outcome of this investigation. But you can choose to take the easier route. Tell the truth. There’s no point in spinning this out any more than it needs to.’ Cormac let a hint of the contempt he felt leak out. ‘It’s undignified.’

  Murtagh bridled, as Cormac had known he would. He pulled himself upright in his plastic chair, then seemed struck again by his surroundings. The reality of his situation caused even false dignity to abandon him. Under normal circumstances Anne Brady would have stepped in by now. She would have interjected, objected, bought her client time to pull himself together, and offered him her confidence to lean on when his deserted him. The problem for James Murtagh was that Anne Brady was there for a very discrete purpose – she would defend James Murtagh up to the point that it was useful for her larger goal, which was, clearly, whatever was on that laptop.

  ‘What I don’t understand is why you killed her,’ Cormac said. ‘She was eighteen years old, without money, power, or connection. You could have intimidated her, or bought her silence. But you threw everything away. You murdered her.’

  Murtagh was shaking his head. He was aging, deteriorating. He seemed thinner, his skin parchment-white and flaking, a tremor in his hands that Cormac had never noticed before. The murder hadn’t been a considered, thought-out plan. It had been a moment of pure fury. Cormac stared at the man opposite him, thought about what drove him. Thought about what might drive Darcy to protect him. Money. Power. It always came back to money and power.

  ‘She did it, didn’t she?’ Cormac said. The words came slowly even as his mind raced. ‘She found the solution. First she figured out that you’d made it all up, then she did what you couldn’t. She found another solution. O
ne that really worked.’

  Murtagh stared back at him, mouth open. The truth was there in his eyes.

  Cormac breathed out, a long silent exhalation.

  ‘Della came to you that night not with a threat, but with a way forward. But she had a price, didn’t she, James? She wanted you to resign. Or she wanted you to come clean.’

  Murtagh’s face twisted in sudden fury. ‘She came to the lab looking for Emma Sweeney and found me instead. She told me that she had figured out the truth, said she wanted to offer me a chance. A chance! To go to the great John Darcy, cap in hand, and confess my sins. And she wanted me to step back from the laboratory, to hand over control to your sainted Emma.’ He laughed and his laugh was angry and bitter. ‘My laboratory. The laboratory that I built, from the ground up.’

  ‘And in return she would show you her solution,’ Cormac said. He was certain of it. Murtagh must have seen enough of it to know that it worked. Otherwise he wouldn’t have gone to such lengths.

  ‘I’d already seen part of it. Carline Darcy’s thesis proposal. That stupid bitch submitted it to me with no clue what she had in her hands.’

  ‘So that’s when you figured it out. That someone else was doing most of her work.’

  That was what had triggered him. Murtagh hadn’t needed the threat to his control of the laboratory to rouse him to murderous fury. He killed Della because she was what he wasn’t and could never be. She was young, and brilliant and creating, and he was old, and blind and a liar. That Carline Darcy had been part of the picture was just the final straw.

  ‘You let her leave and then you went to your car, drove after her and ran her down. Did you doctor the company’s security records? They showed that her ID – Carline Darcy’s ID – was not used to access the lab that evening.’

  A sneer. ‘Easily done.’

  And then what? After he’d killed her he would have walked back to her body, taken her phone, her computer. Planned to steal her work and pass it off as his own.