“What are you doing, that’s making you so sour?”
Munoz had no real interest, but was trying to prod Doyle into returning the question. Pigs would fly. “I am runnin’ a statistics sheet, to correlate burglary patterns with major highways. Its facinatin’ work.”
Munoz could contain herself no longer. “I’m on undercover detail—they recruited me.”
Doyle made a face that communicated her extreme disapproval. “I suppose it’s no surprise that Vice recruited you.”
The other girl looked upon Doyle with a full measure of disdain. “Not Vice, idiot—as if I’d pass as a prostitute.”
“You could be one of those high-class prostitutes,” Doyle insisted, looking up from her keyboard. “You’d pass muster.”
Munoz was distracted into considering this. “Maybe.”
“There you go.”
But Munoz would not be led away from boasting of her triumph, and lowered her voice. “I was recruited by the Anti-Corruption Command.”
This revelation did not improve Doyle’s mood, and so with a mulish mouth, she turned back to her tedious assignment. “Well, if they’re expectin’ the likes of you to exercise some discretion, there’s the end of the kingdom. It was nice while it lasted.”
“It’s not a kingdom; technically. It’s a constitutional monarchy.”
Crossly, Doyle punched in another data point. “A lot of Irish people wouldn’t agree.”
“And not-so-coincidentally, there’re a lot of Irish people on the Watch List.”
Holding on to her temper with both hands, Doyle changed the subject. “So, what’s your cover? If you’re not a prostitute, then you must be posin’ as a dustman’s apprentice—they’ve few other options.”
Munoz was stung into replying, “No; I’m supposed to be a confused foreigner, with poor language skills. I’ll use you as an inspiration.”
Doyle checked herself before firing off the next volley. If Munoz—a beautiful girl, to give the devil her due—was posing as a vulnerable foreigner, this implied that she was working on the corruption-case-that-was-also-a-sex-slavery case, and with a twinge of alarm, Doyle was reminded of the girl’s budding romance with Gerry Lestrade; a suitor who—from all appearances—seemed to be a little too friendly with the questionable immigration authorities. As a result, Doyle came out of her sulks long enough to caution, “You mustn’t mention this assignment to anyone on the outside, you know.”
Munoz gave her a look that was equal parts scorn and condescension. “I’m not that stupid, Doyle.”
Doyle hoped not, but she’d already warned Acton about Lestrade, and presumably he was keeping tabs on that little tangle patch. In an attempt to further her own covert operation, Doyle asked with false heartiness, “What did you think of Gabriel? I think he rather liked you.”
“Nice enough,” said Munoz, with no real interest.
“Nice-lookin’,” prompted Doyle.
“He has a live-in girlfriend.”
“Ah.” So much for that counter-plan.
“What did you think of Lizzie Mathis?” asked Munoz in return, with what could only be described as a knowing smirk.
“Not a lot,” said Doyle. “Especially if she and Acton are havin’ a torrid affair.”
Munoz was stung. “Don’t be an idiot, Doyle—I was only teasing you. If Acton was going to have a torrid affair with anyone, it would be me.”
“Goes without sayin’,” Doyle conceded. “I was just teasin’, too.”
Mollified, Munoz checked her mobile with a self-important gesture. “I’ll be off; I’ll let you know as much as I’m allowed to say.”
“I thank you,” Doyle replied with heavy irony. “I’ll be anxiously awaitin’ your return.”
With a final flip of her hair, Munoz raised a hand in farewell, and moved on. Doyle sat and stewed for a moment, then called Williams.
“Hey.”
“I am literally dyin’ to go out in the field somewhere. D’you need me to interview someone? Anyone? I can’t be still sittin’ here when Munoz comes back, Thomas—she’s bein’ sufferable. ”
“I think you mean insufferable, and as a matter of fact, I know someone who wants to interview you.”
This was unexpected, and Doyle straightened up in surprise. “You do? Who?”
“Gabriel’s little sister is doing a report for school about careers. He asked me if I would ask you to speak with her.”
“Truly? Why didn’t Gabriel ask me himself?”
“Terrified of you.”
Doyle laughed. “I’m terrifyin’, it’s true. Of course I will; do I have to talk about the bridge-jumpin’?”
“I think that’s the major draw, yes.”
“Right, then. I will try to sound brave and useful.”
“Excellent; I’ll tell him.”
“Back to the original subject, Thomas.”
“I do have two interviews lined up; I’m checking in with those detainees who were in the prison’s holding area when the female inmate was killed last year. Supposedly it was a fight, but Acton believes that particular death in custody is worth a second look. You may come along, if you like.”
“Oh, bless you, Thomas. I’m wastin’ away here.” Acton could have no objection, certainly; she’d be with Williams, and besides, these were peripheral interviews concerning a long-cold case—there’d be small chance of running into trouble.
“Then let’s go. We’ll pick up some contraband on the way.”
“You are a saint, is what you are. Meet you in ten.”
As they drove to the first address on the list, Williams briefed her on the particulars. “There were four suspects in the processing area on the evening of the murder. They were all released ahead of schedule, and I think that’s one of the things that interests Acton.”
Doyle had a good guess as to what else had interested Acton. “Was our missin’ matron on duty that day?”
“She was.”
Doyle tried to decide if she felt well enough to make notes whilst they drove, and opted on the side of caution. “So there are four potential witnesses. Any of them immigrants?”
“Two yes, and two no. I’ve already interviewed one of each, but the other two were a little harder to track down.”
They approached the address for the first witness on the list, a housing project teeming with less-affluent members of society. Doyle had a bad experience in a housing project like this one once, and instinctively stayed close to Williams—not a good memory, it was.
They knocked on the door, and it opened to reveal a young woman, heavily pregnant although she surely wasn’t much older than twenty. Mother a’ mercy; that’ll be me, thought Doyle, trying not to goggle at the hugely protruding belly. How does one manage to move about?
The girl invited them in, and asked with no real conviction if they’d care for tea. When they declined, she sank into the well-worn sofa, and gathered her wrap around her tattooed shoulders—it was a bit chilly in the flat, and she wasn’t wearing much. She then waited with no real interest for the two detectives to explain the reason for their visit.
In response to Williams’s questions about the prison altercation, the witness made vague gestures, and seemed to have trouble concentrating. She’d been sent to Wexton Prison for a one-year sentence arising from narcotics trafficking. She’d spent only two hours in holding, and then they’d commuted her sentence, and released her on her own recognizance. She was aware of a commotion of sorts, but was vague about the details. She had no particular recollection of the matron.
Drugs, thought Doyle sadly, who’d seen this story a hundred times; drugs and prostitution, and a baby being born into it. As she and Williams descended the stairway back to the street, she sighed. “It’s so sad, Thomas—that her life has been mapped out already, and there’s little to prevent the certain misery to come.”
“She made her choices; now she must live with them.”
Doyle took a last glance over her shoulder at the childre
n who were playing on the dilapidated playground. “It’s a hard one you are, DI Williams.”
“It’s not so hard to make the right choices.”
Doyle thought of her own mother, abandoned and with a baby. “Sometimes it is.” She could feel his gaze resting on her, and added, “And in any event, the poor baby has no choice—at least mine will have himself a fightin’ chance.”
“It’s a boy?” He smiled at her.
“’Tis.” She smiled back.
“The ultrasound wasn’t so bad, then?”
She hesitated, and then admitted, “I didn’t have one—I just know that it’s a boy.”
He shook his head, as they came to the car. “I’m with Gabriel—you terrify me.”
The next address was a small, terraced house in Earl’s Court, a middle class neighborhood. A girl of about ten informed them that the witness was visiting next door, and went to fetch her, whilst they waited on the stoop.
“Are you followin’ up on Mr. Moran?” Doyle asked, striving for a neutral tone. Williams hadn’t said whether he’d gone to meet the fair Miss Percy, and beguile her list of suspicious cases from her.
“Yes,” he said briefly.
Awaiting further explanation, she eyed him, but he refused to meet her gaze, instead watching the girl return with the witness. “You don’t want to tell me, or you can’t?”
“A little of both.”
She didn’t press him; she’d warned him about Percy, and he was nobody’s fool, was Thomas Williams.
The witness was a plump, older woman, who paused to catch her breath at the base of the steps as she assessed the police officers who stood before her. Overall, she looked to be a very unlikely candidate for prison, but on second thought, there was a defiant gleam in her eye that made Doyle reassess. She looked a bit headstrong; a ruckus-raiser, as Doyle’s mother used to say.
Without preamble, the witness said to Doyle, “You don’t look old enough to be a detective, sweetheart. How old are you?”
“Almost turned twenty-five,” Doyle replied a bit defensively. She was often mistaken for younger, and it never ceased to rankle.
“You’re a baby,” the woman pronounced. “And you should work on that accent.” She then turned to Williams. “And you have all the girls after you, my fine fellow; I’d be after you myself, if I were twenty years younger.”
“May we come in?” Williams gave the woman a charming smile, but apparently she was not as smitten as she professed.
“Not so fast; I know my rights. What’s this all about?”
“We are investigating a death in custody that occurred last year, and we understand you were in the holding area for a time with the decedent.”
With suddenly narrowed eyes, the witness looked them over for a second. She knows something, Doyle thought with surprise. “Any money in this?” the woman asked abruptly.
“I’m afraid that is out of the question,” Williams said firmly. In truth, sometimes they did pay witnesses, but Williams must have decided he didn’t want to pursue that particular path with this particular person. “We can bring you in to headquarters for questioning, or we can take a statement right now.”
Apparently, the witness admired a forceful man, and gave him a look that could only be described as coy. “All right, all right; come in—can’t fault me for trying.”
After they were invited to have a seat at the kitchen table, Doyle leaned to pull her occurrence book out of her rucksack, and then caught a flare of surprise from Williams, seated beside her. She straightened up to find his unreadable gaze upon her, although she could feel he was hiding his intense dismay. “What?” she asked under her breath.
“Nothing,” he replied, and turned to address the witness. “Did you notice anything unusual, the evening that you were in holding?”
“The girl that got killed wanted to have sex with a dead judge,” the woman disclosed with a gleeful air. “I’d say that’s unusual.”
23
Doyle and Williams sat for a moment in silence, digesting the comment. The witness observed their reaction, and settled back into her chair, clearly enjoying herself.
“Tell us what happened, please,” said Williams. “Step by step.”
He already knows something about this, thought Doyle—he’s not that surprised.
“I was supposed to serve a year for domestic violence—knocked the bastard clean out with a fire jack. But then they decided I could do probation, instead, and now I’m living with my niece.” She sounded cheerfully unrepentant.
“Saints and angels,” Doyle exclaimed in wonderment. “How did you manage that; didn’t he see what you were about, comin’ at him with a fire jack?”
“He was drunk as a wheelbarrow,” the woman explained. Then, with a female-to-female look at Doyle, she added, “He had it coming.”
Although Doyle was winding up to ask about the particulars, Williams steered them back to the task at hand. “When did you first see the prisoner—the one who was later killed?”
Crossing her arms, the witness studied the ceiling. “When they first brought me in, the girl was wailing and making a fuss—she was a foreigner, and it was hard to understand her. She wanted to see her baby, and said she wanted to have sex with a judge—although I am cleaning up her language a bit, seeing as you’re so young.” This as an aside to Doyle.
“I appreciate it, I do,” said Doyle, who’d heard language at the Dublin fish market that would shock even this woman.
“The guard told her to be quiet, and that her judge was dead, but that didn’t seem to put a stop to it—she just kept caterwauling.”
Williams offered, “The prison record shows there was an altercation between the dead girl and another prisoner, while they were in holding.”
“No sir,” the witness said with finality. “The hoity-toity matron came and took her away. It was done quiet-like, and I thought it would be best to say nothing, and mind my own business.”
Doyle—who’d learned a lesson from the two Mrs. Addersleys—decided to pin down a description. “What did the ‘hoity-toity’ matron look like? And what made her hoity-toity?”
The witness pursed her lips. “Didn’t seem like someone who worked for a living, if you know what I mean. Nice-looking lady. Dark hair, dark eyes. Fortyish. Seemed foreign to me.”
This was of interest, and Doyle asked, “Can you say where you think she was from?”
The witness contemplated the table for a moment, and then shrugged. “I dunno; she just seemed foreign to me. Lots of foreigners in this neighborhood.”
Williams asked, “Did you hear or see anything afterward?”
“No—then they decided that I could be released. But I wasn’t too surprised when I read in the papers that the crying girl was dead.” She nodded sagely. “It was all very smoky, if you ask me.”
Williams leaned forward and said with all seriousness, “It is very important that you keep this story to yourself. Have you told anyone else?”
“No—I’m no fool. I wouldn’t have told you, except that you sweet-talked it out of me.” She winked at him.
“We’d like you to come into headquarters with us for a statement—,” Doyle began, but Williams raised a cautioning hand.
“No—we’ll write out one here, for your signature.” He handed her his card. “Don’t speak to anyone but me about this, please. If you are contacted by anyone, pretend you have no idea what they’re talking about, and then call me immediately.”
The woman indicated Doyle with a nod of her head. “What about Molly Malone, here?”
Williams smiled. “Don’t even talk to Molly.”
“Just you and me, then,” the woman agreed with a gleam. “Don’t worry; I’ll be keeping my mouth shut.”
“Good girl,” he said approvingly, and she grinned at him, exposing a questionable set of teeth.
After the statement was written out, and the witness cautioned yet again, they walked out to get back into the unmarked. Doyle was quiet, tur
ning over this latest revelation in her mind, and trying not to be alarmed that Williams didn’t even want the witness to come into headquarters. Surely, the Met hadn’t been compromised by this corruption ring? She was still deep in thought when she realized—after a few moments—that Williams had not started the car. She looked over to see that he was sitting in the driver’s seat, regarding her very seriously.
“Why are you wearing a vest?”
She blushed to the roots of her hair, and couldn’t decide what to say, so she stammered, “Just a precaution I’m takin’, is all.”
He held her eyes with his own. “Kath, we are not going anywhere until you tell me why you are wearing a vest.”
She took refuge in being offended. “It’s none of your business, Thomas.”
“Tell me.”
Short of leaping out of the vehicle and making a run for it, she didn’t see any other option. “I’ve been havin’ dreams that the baby is in danger—or somethin’. It’s truly not very clear.”
He frowned, thinking this over. “Danger from who?”
“Whom,” she corrected. “And that’s just it; I don’t know—I haven’t a clue.”
After a few moments of silence, he concluded, “And Acton is worried enough to have you wear a vest.”
“Yes,” she admitted.
He was angry, was DI Williams. “You should have told me, Kath.”
“Thomas,” she said reasonably. “How could I? It sounds absolutely crazy.”
“I would never have taken you with me today, had I known this.”
Now it was Doyle’s turn to be angry. “You sound like Acton—I’m not going to be locked away for fear I’ll stub a toe; I’ll go barkin’ mad, Thomas.”
Murder in Containment: A Doyle and Acton Mystery Page 14