by Gregson, J M
‘Entirely possible. What did you find?’
‘I found that the Kathleen O’Connor who was involved with Walsh’s brother had committed suicide. She took an overdose in 1989. I don’t know whether it was connected with the Walsh episode of the previous year or not, but it seems likely. His sister’s death would certainly make Adrian O’Connor bitter.’
‘But surely it would have been more logical to pursue the younger brother, Dennis Walsh, who was the man directly involved?’
‘Maybe they did. Dennis Walsh was shot dead at the beginning of 1990. He opened his door late in the evening of January seventeenth and was shot through the head at point-blank range. No one ever found out who did it.’
‘But I suppose it looked like O’Connor or some agent of his.’
‘Eric Walsh certainly thought so. And he felt that as head of the Walsh group at the time, he was also a target.’
‘And if he hired you to investigate matters, I presume he felt he was still a target.’
‘He did. Perhaps with some reason. Adrian O’Connor arrived in Brunton three and a half years ago. Out of the blue, as far as Eric Walsh was concerned. He then set about getting close to Walsh. Again, it’s only Walsh who says that, and I imagine O’Connor would say the idea was ridiculous.’
‘He already has said so, to us. Did you find anything to support Walsh’s view that he was a target?’
‘Nothing definite enough to warrant an arrest. Quite a lot of circumstantial stuff.’
‘Such as?’
‘The way O’Connor arrived here, for a start. He’s an engineer, now working as an executive for the Shell Oil Company. I made a few enquiries in Manchester. He’d spent most of his Shell career in the Middle East and London. He applied for a transfer to the north-west, for “personal reasons”. He turned down Cumbria and Cheshire, but accepted a job in Preston.’
‘Couldn’t it have been a normal promotion?’
‘It wasn’t that. He got no rise in salary and moved at the same grade. If you look at his bonuses, he probably took a small drop in salary to take the job in Preston. And he immediately bought a house not in Preston, but in Brunton.’
Peach pursed his lips. ‘It’s only ten miles away. But let’s agree between ourselves that it represents fairly strong circumstantial evidence that he was looking to get near Walsh. Is there more?’
‘A little. O’Connor hadn’t been a Freemason at any time, nor shown any interest in the movement. Within six months of arriving in Brunton, he had managed to get himself into the Brunton Lodge. I’ve checked that with the man who introduced him to the Lodge. Eric Walsh thought it was all part of a plan to get nearer to him. He thought O’Connor enjoyed turning up wherever Eric went and watching him sweat. He did it with his singing engagements, not just with the Masons.’
‘He might have been doing just that, of course. Watching him sweat and enjoying it. Persuading Walsh that he had designs on his life. He may not actually have killed him.’
‘Exactly. Which is why I’m happy to pass all this on to you now. If someone else killed Eric Walsh, though, it would be quite a coincidence, when you have a man at hand who seems to have been threatening him. Was O’Connor anywhere near the scene of the crime?’
Peach frowned. ‘He was near it all right, but not at the right time. He claims to have left the White Bull whilst Walsh was still alive, and it looks as if that’s genuine. He was quite tightly parked and one of the hotel staff watched him go to make sure he didn’t scrape anyone else. He confirms that O’Connor was off the premises by eleven fifteen last Friday night, when we know Walsh was still alive.’
‘I suppose he could have got someone else to do his killing.’
‘Indeed. But no one in the hotel spotted any strangers around. But a contract killer would have made it his business not to be seen. We shall need to have further words with Mr Adrian O’Connor.’
*
It is a common enough story. Loan sharks encourage people to take on impossible loans, at rates of interest which merely add to the problems. When the borrowers default on the repayments, they have to be taught a lesson: the loan shark may already have had his money and more back in interest, but it doesn’t do to let the defaulters get away with anything. Bad for discipline, that is: other borrowers might be encouraged to default on their repayments, if the axe of retribution does not fall quickly.
In the murky world of the sharks, violence is never far away. Defaulters are dealt with quickly and firmly. Not by the shark himself, of course, but by his well-paid agents. A broken nose, the occasional broken arm; for repeat offenders, a serious beating-up. It is not personal, the victims are given to understand, but to discourage others from defaulting. The word gets round and other potential defaulters cringe and pay up.
That is the theory of the matter, and practice generally follows theory without many complications. But the muscle-men who work for loan sharks are not notable for their intelligence; they are employed for things other than brainpower. And occasionally their judgement lets them down and they overdo things. Instead of quietly limping away after having been taught a sharp lesson, their victims end up in hospital. The loan shark does not like this at all, for it excites police attention.
Lucy Blake smiled into the woman’s face, trying to conceal how much its injuries disturbed her. There was a livid purple valley down one side of the features where the cheek had been pushed in and the skin seemed to have disappeared altogether. One eye was closed and the swollen lips were twisted into a permanent crooked smile. It was impossible to tell how old she was.
Lucy said gently, ‘This should never have happened to you. Should never happen to anyone. We’ll put them behind bars for you.’
The single eye looked not at her but at the high ceiling of the ward. ‘Can’t pay. They’ve done all this to me and I still can’t pay.’
The voice was no more than a croak, but the despair which lay behind the words was more awful than their distorted sound. Lucy said, ‘They won’t do it again. With your help, we’ll get them, Beth.’ She’d no idea how, but her voice carried conviction: at that moment she was very determined.
‘Are they all right?’
For an instant, Lucy struggled to understand. Then she said, ‘The children are fine, Beth. They’re in good hands. They’ll come and see you when you feel a bit better.’
‘Not now. Not like this.’ It was the first animation she had shown, and the single eye turned for the first time to the earnest young face beside the bed. ‘You’re police, aren’t you?’
Lucy smiled, doing her best to reassure. ‘Yes. Detective Sergeant Blake, of Brunton CID. Lucy to you.’
Gratitude for a moment in that single eye, then alarm. ‘I can’t help you, love. They’ll come back, you know. Get the kids.’
‘They won’t do that, Beth. They might threaten it, but they never attack kids. There’s no point: kids don’t have money.’
‘Neither do I, but they did this to me. They’ve had all I get from the social, for the last three weeks. I had to try to feed the kids.’
Lucy fought down the rising tide of anger. This ruined creature was probably no older than her, possibly even younger. Sounding off would be a relief, but it wouldn’t help anyone. She leaned forward, took the small hand lying on the blankets between hers, and said gently, ‘Who were they, Beth, the men who did this? It’s time for us to go after them.’
The voice from the damaged face said hopelessly, ‘I don’t know. Really I don’t. I hadn’t seen them before. Big men, with big fists.’ A shudder ran through the slim form beneath the blankets.
Lucy was conscious of the nurse, hovering at the edge of the screen round the bed as she heard the exhaustion in the voice. She said desperately, ‘We need to protect you and others like you, Beth. Whom did you borrow the money from in the first place?’
The seconds stretched agonizingly, until Lucy wondered whether the woman in the bed was refusing to answer or had lost consciousness. The single ey
e was closed now. The nurse was coming to the bedside to tell Lucy she must leave when the faint voice beside her said, ‘Cartwright. Darren Cartwright.’
*
‘It isn’t very convenient, you know, all this.’ Adrian O’Connor looked round his comfortable office, with its square of thick carpet on highly polished wood flooring, its four comfortable armchairs, its drinks cabinet in the corner, its prints of old Preston docks and 1930s adverts advising motorists with overcoats and cheerful smiles to ‘Fill up with Shell’ on the walls.
He didn’t look inconvenienced, thought Percy Peach. Bit of a contrast with his own cramped office, this. He said unhurriedly, ‘We’ve been looking into your background, Mr O’Connor. Not DS Blake or me personally, but members of our team.’
O’Connor, who had been standing and looking out of the window towards the estuary of the River Ribble after inviting them to sit down, sighed and kept his eyes on the wide expanse of water for a few seconds. Then he turned abruptly and came and sat in one of the armchairs opposite them. ‘Is that news supposed to frighten me, Inspector?’
‘That’s up to you. It might give you food for thought.’
‘I don’t see why it should. I’ve no doubt you’ve turned up the startling news that I have links with the Irish Republican Movement in Ireland.’
‘Irish Republican Army, Mr O’Connor. An illegal organization. A terrorist organization.’
Adrian smiled. He wasn’t going to be intimidated by that. It was an old accusation, one which he had thrown back into the faces of worthier opponents than this stocky policeman and his beautiful sidekick. ‘One man’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter, Inspector Peach.’
‘You’ve given money to them, these murderers who shoot men in front of their children and shatter the kneecaps of defenceless boys. You’ve taken an active part in their activities yourself, in the past.’
O’Connor lifted an eyebrow, finding the gestures he had practised in negotiations within the firm useful now in this other context. ‘I doubt if you could prove that, Inspector. In any case, it’s all a long time ago. We do things as young men we would not countenance later in life.’ He was easy with himself and them, knowing that they had not really come here to talk about this.
Adrian remembered much tenser conversations with the Ulster police, years ago, when it was touch and go whether they would have to let him go free or not. This one, on his own comfortable ground, from the safety of his successful business life, was going to be much easier. ‘I made no secret of my desire for a united Ireland when we last met. I’m not alone in those views: there are a good couple of million of us, I would suggest.’
Peach said, ‘Your past activities may or may not have a bearing on this visit. Those who have acquired a taste for violence as young men often resort to it again much later, when they feel pressure.’
‘I am not under pressure.’
‘Why did you take this job, Mr O’Connor?’
The suddenness of Peach’s question shook him, despite his determination to remain calm. ‘That is surely irrelevant. It is certainly impertinent. My employment is none of your business.’
‘You refuse to answer?’
‘I refuse to discuss the details of my professional life with some jumped-up police inspector.’
Peach was delighted to hear his man rattled. He raised the arches of his black eyebrows expressively and said, ‘It’s not irrelevant. We have reason to believe that you took your present post for a particular reason.’
Adrian O’Connor forced himself to be calm, to give this bumptious man his most patronizing smile. ‘It was a promotion. Even you must have had those, to become an inspector, so you should understand.’
‘Our information is that it was not a promotion. We know that you turned down other situations in the north-west of England. That you took a slight drop in salary to come here.’
Adrian’s anger burst out now. ‘You know a damn sight too much, if you ask me! And if you’ve been using the resources of the police service to pry into my career with Shell, I can assure you you’ll regret it very —’
‘We don’t reveal our sources, Mr O’Connor. I will tell you that there has been no police investigation of your background with the Shell Oil Company. Are you saying that what I have just said is incorrect?’
‘I’m not going to comment on your assumptions.’
‘We now believe that you came here for a particular reason.’
Adrian found that he didn’t want them to put that reason into words. It would be one step nearer to disaster to hear it voiced a second time. He stood up and walked over to the window again, looking west at the glinting of the sun on the water as it moved towards its early setting. ‘This is a pleasant part of the world to live in. You don’t realize how beautiful the Ribble Valley is until you’ve been here. The image of Lancashire as all mills and industrial smoke is very far from the truth. But you know that, you two. You live in the area. Play golf at the North Lancashire Golf Club, in your case, Inspector.’ He enjoyed displaying a little knowledge of his own.
Peach raised the black eyebrows a millimetre further than seemed possible. ‘You’re saying that you took this job to live in a pleasant environment?’
Adrian turned and returned with measured tread to sit in the armchair again. ‘I’ve had a successful career with Shell. More successful than I ever envisaged when I started. When you get towards forty and you have a comfortable salary, you decide that there are more important things than money. I’d had enough of living in cities long ago, when I was in Belfast.’
Percy Peach smiled and looked at Lucy Blake. She said, ‘We have reason to believe that you came to this area to get near to Eric Walsh.’
Adrian had known for the last few minutes that this would come, but to hear it stated in such calm tones by the smooth face beneath the fringe of red-brown hair was more unnerving than if it had come from Peach. He said. ‘You made the same tiresome suggestion last time we met. I refuted it then and I do so again. I’m quite sure you’re unable to substantiate your accusation.’
DS Blake gave him a small smile which lit up her young face, making what she said even more of a contrast. ‘We don’t have to substantiate it, Mr O’Connor. We are asking you whether it’s true.’
‘No, it isn’t. Of course it isn’t.’
‘I see. It’s the opinion of our source — which as Inspector Peach told you we cannot reveal — that you came to the area to be near Eric Walsh. That you went to concerts and other occasions where he sang just to get closer to him. That you took up Freemasonry and joined the North Brunton Lodge specifically because Mr Walsh was a member of that group. That you had a grudge against Mr Walsh which stemmed from the Walshes’ association with your sister in Belfast in 1988 and her subsequent suicide. That you were determined to get even with Mr Walsh and were planning some violent retribution.’
Adrian was shaken by this cool recital from a young woman who had hardly spoken previously. He forced himself to be calm, tried to inject some conviction into his voice as he said, ‘It’s a pack of lies, that, from someone’s fevered imagination. Perhaps from Eric Walsh himself. He had it coming to him, that man. I’m delighted it happened when it did!’
Despite his attempt at composure, he had almost yelled the last words about Walsh. It was undoubtedly a mistake, but he didn’t see how they could make him pay for it.
Peach allowed the silence after his shout to stretch before he reminded him, ‘You were at the Lodge Ladies’ Night when this man died, Mr O’Connor.’
‘And I left before he was killed. We established that at our last meeting, Inspector.’
‘No, Mr O’Connor, we didn’t establish it. You told us that it was so.’
‘Are you now disputing that I left at eleven fifteen?’
‘No. As a matter of fact, we have found one of the hotel staff who supports your story. He confirms that you asked him if the hotel clock in the reception area was right as you went out to your car. It
was then ten past eleven.’
‘Really? Well, I don’t remember that, but no doubt it happened if you say it did.’
‘Very fortunately for you, since it confirms your story.’
‘Yes. I suppose you’re now going to claim I bribed this worker at the White Bull to lie for me.’
‘No. He seems genuine enough.’
‘I’m glad to hear it.’
‘We have also interviewed another hotel worker who watched you extricate your car from a tight space at eleven fifteen.’
Adrian tried hard not to smile. ‘I didn’t know that.’
‘So who do you think killed this man you say deserved all he got?’
Adrian O’Connor had recovered his composure. He made himself take his time over his reply. They weren’t going to arrest him, despite this stocky man’s truculence. ‘I’m happy to say I’ve no idea who killed Eric Walsh. And I hope you never catch him!’
Seventeen
The morning of Wednesday the fourteenth of November saw the first sharp frost of the winter. The grass was white in the fields and the public park as Peach drove to work. A brilliant sun burnished the autumn gold of the trees with new bright reds and oranges after the frost. It was altogether a wonderful morning to be alive. Unless, of course, you had a meeting with Superintendent Tommy Bloody Tucker as your first duty of the day.
Percy had had an interesting conversation with the forensic laboratory at Chorley before he left home, which meant that Tucker was in the station before him. As Peach climbed out of his police Mondeo, he saw malicious intent in the bright eyes of one of the station pigeons. Sure enough, within two seconds it defecated copiously and accurately on to the very middle of the windscreen of Superintendent Tucker’s dark blue BMW. Peach turned back to his car and produced the last quarter of a bag of crisps. Even so plump a bird deserved a reward. Perhaps today wasn’t to be such a bad day after all.
Tucker was bright and cheerful when Peach had climbed the stairs to the penthouse office. ‘Made an arrest yet, Percy?’ he asked breezily.