Buried

by Graham Masterton

  Katie jotted down some notes. She was trying to think of ways in which she could improve response times without incurring extra costs, and it wasn’t easy. If Bobby Quilty had been guilty of nothing more than cigarette-smuggling, she would have been inclined to agree with Jimmy O’Reilly that present budget restrictions made it uneconomical to go after him. As Detective Dooley had said just yesterday, ‘It’s only money, after all, and the nation’s health, and when did we ever care about either of those before now? What about the Godfather fry-up at Tony’s Bistro? Eight sausages and six rashers and four slices of black pudding! I know it’s in aid of charity, but how healthy is that?’

  As Katie worked, she continually flicked her eyes across to the mapping plan on her laptop, but Bobby Quilty’s pickup remained stationary outside his house.

  She had almost finished her report on response times when Detective Sergeant Begley rang her. She could tell immediately from the sound of his voice that something was badly wrong.

  ‘Sean! Did you get the warrant all right?’

  ‘Oh, sure, I got the warrant,’ he told her. ‘Judge Coughlan was kind of uppity about it at first, but when I told her that we were looking to build a case against Bobby Quilty she issued it straight off. I got the feeling that she’s allergic to the Big Feller.’

  ‘I know that. She had to let him off twice last year on charges of extortion because we couldn’t find any witnesses with enough nerve to give evidence against him. So, what have you found? Anything? Have the lovebirds flown the nest?’

  ‘No, they’re still here, the both of them.’

  ‘And? Are you bringing them in?’

  ‘They’re both dead, ma’am. Shot in the head. Looks like a suicide pact, but if Bobby Quilty’s involved, you never can tell, can you?’

  ‘Dead? Mother of God! Where did you find them?’

  ‘In bed, lying with their backs to each other, but head to head. Chisel blew his brains out and hers, too, with just the one bullet. It’s a pig’s dinner, I can tell you. Here – hold on – I’ll go back into the bedroom so that you can see for yourself.’

  After a moment’s hesitation a view of the bedroom at Leitrim Street appeared on Katie’s desktop computer, tilting sideways as Detective Sergeant Begley approached the mattress and slowly scanned the two naked bodies lying back to back. Then he held his camera close to Chisel’s hand, so that she could see the gun that he was holding.

  ‘How long do you think they’ve been dead?’ asked Katie.

  ‘They’re both in full rigor, so they were probably lying here dead when we first came around this morning. We’ve called the technicians, so they should be able to give us a more accurate time once they’ve taken their temperature and all that.’

  ‘Any sign of a suicide note?’

  ‘No, nothing. Mind you, I doubt if either of those two could read or write.’

  ‘No witnesses? Nobody heard anything, or saw anything?’

  ‘Nobody that we’ve talked to so far. This is a fierce noisy junction between Leitrim Street and Pine Street, especially first thing in the morning, so that’s hardly surprising.’

  ‘All the same, Sean, that’s a SIG Sauer 2022. Nice gun, but not the quietest weapon in the world.’

  Detective Sergeant Begley slowly walked around the mattress, giving Katie a panoramic view of the two white bodies, and then a close-up of Sorcia’s devastated face. When Katie saw the beef-red sinus cavities and the flapped-down letterbox jaw she was glad that she hadn’t eaten anything since she had come back from CUH.

  She glanced again at the mapping plan. Bobby Quilty’s pickup still hadn’t moved.

  ‘All right, Sean,’ she said. ‘I’ll come straight up there. You have Detective Scanlan with you, don’t you?’

  ‘Scanlan and two uniforms. They’ve already called Superintendent Pearse for backup.’

  ‘Is Scanlan okay?’

  ‘Scanlan? She’s grand altogether. To tell you the truth, I think her stomach’s stronger than mine. I was craw sick when I first walked into that bedroom and found those two squatters lying there with their heads blown off. Jesus, they smelled bad enough when they were alive.’

  ‘I’ll bring Dooley with me,’ said Katie. ‘He has a cast-iron stomach, too.’

  Katie rang Alan and told him what had happened and where she was going.

  ‘Rather you than me,’ he told her. He paused, and hiccupped. ‘I’ve only just finished an eight-ounce beefburger and I think I wolfed it down too quick.’

  ‘Keep a watch on Quilty for me, won’t you, and ring me or text me as soon as you see any sign of movement.’

  ‘Don’t you worry, Katie,’ he said, and hiccupped again. ‘He’ll only have to budge an inch and I’ll know about it.’

  ‘Hold your breath and count to a hundred,’ Katie told him. ‘I’ll ring you later so.’

  *

  She stood by the door and watched while three of Bill Phinner’s technical experts examined the bodies and the bedroom. One of them was taking photographs of Chisel and Sorcia, while the other two were down on their hands and knees with SPEX Forensics HandScopes. Centimetre by centimetre they were systematically shining infra-red and ultra-violet light on to the carpet and the skirting boards and walls, searching for shoe prints and any other kind of indentations, as well as hairs and fibres and fluids.

  Bill Phinner stood close beside Katie, with his brow furrowed, and he kept making little sucking noises, as if this was the very last place he wanted to be. Katie had sprayed perfume on to her handkerchief and was holding it over her nose and mouth. The bedroom smelled overwhelmingly of stale cigarette smoke and excrement and dead fish, and with their pallid skin and all their tattoos Chisel and Sorcia reminded her of the common goby that her father used to catch in the River Lee estuary. He never ate them, because they were the bottom of the food chain. Rather like Chisel and Sorcia, thought Katie, even though she knew that was less than Christian.

  ‘So what time did they die, do you think?’ she asked Bill. ‘They were in rigor already when Detective Sergeant Begley broke in, so he reckoned that they must have been dead before he came round at half past five this morning.’

  ‘From their rigor and their body temperatures, I’d say at least eighteen hours ago. We’ve taken some blood samples so we can narrow it down more exactly than that, but a fairly good estimate is ten or eleven last night.’

  Detective Sergeant Begley came into the room behind Katie. ‘That bedside lamp was lit when we first entered the room, so I think it’s fair to assume that it was night-time.’

  Katie took her handkerchief away from her face, but tried not to breathe in too deeply. ‘Let’s face it, we see a fair number of double suicides don’t we? But they’re mostly old couples, when one or both of them is terminally ill, and in practically every case they take an overdose.’

  ‘Oh, we’ve had one or two exceptions,’ Bill Phinner put in. ‘You remember that poor old couple who jumped in front of a train at Kent station last year, hand in hand?’

  ‘Of course. And those two who drove their car into Lough Mahon and just sat in it while it sank? But double suicides like that are very rare, like. And whenever guns are involved, it’s almost always the man who shoots the woman and then shoots himself. I’ve never seen a double suicide like this, with only one shot. How did he know that she wasn’t going to sit up at the very last moment and he’d only end up killing himself and not her?’

  Detective Scanlan appeared behind Detective Sergeant Begley. Katie thought she was looking a little pale, and there were dark circles under her eyes. ‘Do you want to come and take a sconce at the living room, ma’am? I think it poses more questions than it answers, do you know what I mean?’

  ‘Yes, I’ll come now,’ said Katie. ‘I think I need a breather, anyway.’

  ‘Don’t entirely blame you,’ said Bill Phinner. ‘There’s some whiff in here, isn’t there? Would you believe that before I decided to take up forensics I was going to go and work for Topps in
Ballincollig making lollipops and Life Savers? It might not have been so meaningful, the work, but by God it would have smelled sweeter.’

  Katie went across to the living room where Detective Dooley was taking notes and another of Bill Phinner’s technical experts was taking photographs.

  ‘So what are the questions?’ asked Katie, although she could see for herself that the TV was still on, even though the sound was muted, and there were open cans of Murphy’s on the floor, as well as packets of cigarettes, two over-full ashtrays and a copy of the Racing Post. She was reminded of the scene of Darragh Murphy’s murder – an ordinary evening that had been suddenly and violently interrupted.

  ‘It strikes me as fierce quare that they should have been sitting here drinking and smoking and watching the telly but then they decide to get up and go into the bedroom and take off all of their clothes and kill themselves. Those two cans of stout are still nearly full, like they had only just been opened.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Detective Dooley. ‘If it really was a suicide pact, you’d have thought they would have sat here and finished their drinks. A last toast to life, do you know what I mean? And if they didn’t finish their drinks because they had a blazing argument, they wouldn’t have gone to bed and laid down that way back to back and shot themselves together. One of them would have shot the other, or vice versa, and then himself, or herself, as the case may be.’

  ‘I spoke to the woman who lives in the flat next door,’ said Detective Scanlan. ‘She said they were always at each other’s throats and some of the rows they had were, like, epic. Always effing and blinding. The language they used would have a made a knacker blush, that’s what she said. But she didn’t hear them argue last night, or this morning.’

  ‘And she didn’t hear any gunshot, either,’ added Detective Dooley. ‘If she could hear them swearing at each other, surely she could have heard a SIG Sauer blowing their heads off – that would have been more than 140 decibels. On the other hand, they were always slamming doors and throwing furniture at each other, so she might not have realized that it was a gunshot and not a chair.’

  ‘So your thinking is...?’ Katie asked them, looking around. The smell of cigarettes was so strong in here that it made her eyes water. It permeated everything, the curtains, the carpet, the furniture. The ceiling was stained brown with nicotine, the way that pub ceilings used to be.

  ‘Well, like you’re always telling us, ma’am, don’t jump to any premature conclusions,’ said Detective Scanlan. ‘In this case, though, both Dooley and I believe that they were murdered by a third party – or parties, most likely. And they were taken by surprise, like, because we found a Browning Hi-Power automatic on top of the toilet cistern, which was probably Chisel’s. It’s an old one, with gaffer tape around the butt, but it was loaded and made ready. So he would have been able to defend himself against an intruder if he had been given enough warning.’

  ‘The downstairs doors were both locked, front and back,’ said Detective Dooley. ‘They hadn’t been forced, either. If it wasn’t suicide, which we don’t believe it was, then there’s four possibilities. The first is that one of the doors was originally unlocked, so that the intruders could just walk in. The second is that Chisel or Sorcia opened the door for them because they knew them. The third is that they opened the door for them even though they didn’t know them but they were immediately forced to let them in. The fourth is that the intruders had a key.’

  ‘I think you’re right,’ said Katie. ‘And since this building is owned by Bobby Quilty, even though it’s only through a holding company, I think your fourth possibility is by far the most likely.’

  ‘Wouldn’t Bobby Quilty have done more to cover his tracks?’ asked Detective Dooley. ‘I mean, leaving the telly on like that, and these half-empty cans of stout. That’s pure amateur.’

  Katie shrugged. ‘Maybe Bobby Quilty wasn’t involved in person, although the way these two were murdered, that has all the hallmarks of a Bobby Quilty punishment – like Darragh Murphy’s. Well – maybe not punishment so much as insurance, to make sure they couldn’t give evidence against him and to frighten off anybody else who might be thinking of informing on him.’

  She thought for a moment and then she said, ‘I believe it was him, and I have the feeling that he was here, but I don’t think he gave a tinker’s damn about the details, like the telly and everything. All he needed was an alibi in case we lift him on suspicion – “It was suicide, your honour, I didn’t have nothing to do with it.” Nobody else is going to be brave enough to say different.’

  Bill Phinner came into the living room, still frowning – always sour and serious, with a permanent air of professional disappointment about him.

  ‘I heard what you said, ma’am, and you’re absolutely correct. It wasn’t suicide, either double or single. The male victim is holding the gun, but the HandScope showed that he has no gunpowder residue on his fingers whatsoever, so he didn’t fire it himself. Firing that particular weapon can sometimes leave redness on the web between finger and thumb, and there’s no sign of that either.

  ‘On top of that, there’s a semicircular impression in the skin around the entry wound in the male victim’s forehead. It doesn’t match the muzzle of the gun, but it’s consistent in diameter with the muzzle of a silencer being pressed hard against his forehead. My armaments expert in there is probably showing off, but he thinks it could have been a Griffin Revolution or a Gemtech Tundra, which is a lightweight silencer that’s ideal for a SIG Sauer 2022. Personally, I doubt if we’ll be able to identify the make of silencer conclusively. Whichever one of those it was, though, it was fitted to the gun when it was fired, and they’re eighteen centimetres in length, which would have made the weapon far too long for the male victim to hold it against his own head at that particular angle.’

  ‘So it was murder,’ said Katie.

  ‘No question,’ said Bill Phinner. ‘I’d go further than that myself, even as a man of science, and say that it was an execution.’

  He had only just uttered the word ‘execution’ when Katie’s iPhone pinged. ‘Excuse me,’ she said. It was a text message from Alan.

  BQ on the move. On N8 headed east.

  Katie said, ‘Okay, everybody. I have to go now. A summons from on high. Bill, thank you, as usual. Sean, Michael, Padragain, I’ll leave you to finish up here. See you after at the station.’

  With that, she hurried down the stairs and out on to Leitrim Street. Two more patrol cars had just arrived and five gardaí had cordoned off the entire pavement in front of the building. She ducked under the blue-and-white tape and crossed over to her car.

  If Bobby Quilty was heading east on the N8 it could be that he was simply driving to Fota to play a round of golf. He was a member, after all. But if he turned left at the second roundabout he would be joining the M8, which could take him north to Belfast.

  She turned on the engine, but before she drove off she texted Alan: On my way. 5 mins.

  Forty-two

  She was turning into MacCurtain Street when Alan texted her again: BQs taken M8. Going N.

  She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as she waited at the lights at the end of the Brian Boru Bridge, where Detective Barry had been crushed. If Bobby Quilty was on his way north, then maybe her plan was going to work out – at least partially. The driver in front of her was slow to move off when the lights turned green and she repeatedly blew her horn at him. He turned around and glared at her as if she had interrupted him saying a novena to St Monica, the patron saint of patience.

  Alan was waiting for her outside the Market Tavern. She lifted her laptop off the passenger seat and when he had climbed in and fastened his seat belt she handed it to him.

  ‘There... It’s already logged in to the mapping plan.’

  Alan showed her the app on his phone. ‘He’s just passed Rathcormac. He’ll be going through Fermoy in a couple of minutes. He’s really giving it the tittie, if you’ll excuse the expr
ession.’

  Katie watched as the tiny car symbol flashed up on the screen every five seconds. It looked on the app as if Bobby Quilty was gradually creeping his way north, but in reality he must be driving at over 130 kph, at least 10 kph over the speed limit. Against all of her professional instincts she found herself praying that he would slow down – the last thing she wanted was for him to be pulled over for speeding.

  As she drove eastwards alongside the river she put in a call to Detective Inspector O’Rourke. When he answered he sounded as if he had his mouth full.

  ‘What’s the story, ma’am?’

  ‘I’m sorry to do this to you at such short notice, Francis, but I’ve had a bit of a family crisis and I’ll be needing to take the rest of the day off, and probably tomorrow as well. Have you heard from DS Begley about that pair found dead at Leitrim Street?’

  ‘I have, yes. Don’t worry about it. Do you want me to make a statement to the media about it? I can liaise with Superintendent Pearse if you do.’

  ‘All you need to tell the media at the moment is that we suspect the deaths were murder and that we’re investigating further,’ Katie told him. ‘And of course make the usual appeal for witnesses. How’s it going with that water meter protest?’

  ‘They’ve called it off, thank God. For now, anyway. I never had to deal with such a bunch of raving headbangers in the whole of my career, I’ll tell you. The way they talk, you’d think that water meters were invented by Satan.’

  ‘Thanks, Francis. If anything urgent comes up you can contact me at any time. I’ll send you a text as soon as I know when I’ll be back.’

  Alan was keeping his eye on the mapping plan. ‘He’s passing Fermoy now. He’s still heading north on the M8. Just going over the Blackwater River. Still speeding.’

  Then he turned to Katie and said, ‘You’re a consummate liar, you know that, don’t you? “Family crisis” – I almost believed you myself when you said that!’

  ‘Well, it’s true in a way. John is practically family, and so is Kyna. Take a look in the glovebox.’