‘Possibly not,’ I conceded.
‘Then why the fuck are you so wrapped up in finding it?’ he asked, his smile twisting on his lips.
I couldn’t think of a satisfactory response. The Coke in my glass suddenly tasted sickeningly syrupy.
After I left Curran, I called Jim Hendry and told him about the closure of Eligius and the possibility that whatever Leon had posted out of the building would be arriving the following morning. He promised me he would do what he could, but I began to suspect that he was getting fed up with my requests.
That night, Debbie and I got the kids to bed and had just sat down to watch something on the TV when my mobile rang. I didn’t recognize the number and it took me a moment to place the voice.
‘Inspector Devlin?’
‘Yes,’ I said, shrugging to Debbie, who was demanding to know who had interrupted our night on the sofa.
‘Linda Campbell here, Inspector. We met at—’
‘Ms Campbell, I remember you. How can I help you?’
She paused for a moment. ‘It’s not me who needs your help. It’s Fearghal. He’s been arrested at Orcas.’
The previous day, Weston had contacted the National Museum, requesting that Fearghal and Linda be sent up to Orcas. He wanted their help with the preparations for ‘Kate’s’ transportation to America, where she was to join the personal collection of Cathal Hagan.
Fearghal confided to Linda that he suspected the decision to involve him constituted a public smack on the wrists for his brother’s actions. Weston had apparently wasted no opportunity in reminding Fearghal that Ireland was losing this unique cultural artefact because of Leon’s recklessness. It was a national embarrassment, he said.
Biting his tongue, Fearghal had gone for dinner with Linda. During the meal, he had become increasingly drunk and agitated. He had spoken about the loss of his brother and the loss of Kate as if they were somehow connected. If they had never found Kate, he said, none of this might have happened. And if he could keep Kate in the country, he might retain some dignity. His brother might be proud of him, wherever he was. Halfway through the meal he lifted his keys and strode out of the restaurant.
Apparently he made his way to the goldmine, where Kate was lying in her transport case, ready for her journey to America the following morning.
Using the wheel brace from the boot of his car, Fearghal had smashed his way into the building. He was caught on security cameras, clambering through the shattered remains of the front door and making a beeline for the crate he had helped pack hours earlier. Using the edge of the brace intended for removing wheel trims, Fearghal had managed to prize open the top of the crate.
He was then filmed smashing in the container in which Kate was sealed. Pushing his hands though the broken glass, he lifted the woman’s body out and made his way back to the car park.
Alerted by the burglar alarm, the Guards found him struggling back towards the pit in which Kate had been discovered, her desiccated body cradled in his arms.
I collected Linda from her hotel and we drove together to the station. She was on edge for the duration of the journey and I tried with little luck to engage her in conversation.
‘Have you and Fearghal been dating long?’ I asked.
She turned her face towards me. ‘We’re not dating,’ she snapped quickly. ‘He was my tutor at college.’
‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I thought . . .’
‘Fearghal helped me through a bad patch when I was a student. He’s a good man.’
‘We were good friends once,’ I agreed.
‘He told me so,’ she replied. ‘He used to look up to you, he said.’
It was my turn to look at her. She turned her head away and did not speak again for the rest of the journey.
When we got to the station, Fearghal had already been charged and bailed. He sat on a plastic chair in the foyer, a brown envelope on the floor beside him into which his possessions had been placed following his arrest. He was bent double in the chair, as if winded, his head resting on his hands. When we came in he looked up. His face was puffy and pale, his forehead shining with sweat. His eyes were red-ringed and bleary.
He swallowed drily and attempted to say my name. I put my hand on his shoulder, while Linda sat down next to him and asked him how he had been treated.
‘Fine,’ he muttered. ‘How’s Kate?’
Linda looked up at me before answering, which in itself told him all he needed to know.
‘She’s . . . she’s badly damaged,’ she said.
‘Come on, Fearghal,’ I said, helping him up off his seat. ‘Time to go.’
He leant his weight on me as we crossed the road to my car.
‘I’m sorry, Benny,’ he said, patting my back with his hand. ‘I’ve caused nothing but trouble since I got here.’
‘Don’t worry about it, Fearghal,’ I said. ‘Still fighting the good fight, eh?’
‘I couldn’t let Hagan get his fucking hands on her. They’ll not be able to sell her now,’ Fearghal said.
‘Get that drunk out of here,’ a voice called from behind us. Still holding on to Fearghal, I turned around.
Harry Patterson and John Weston stood at the door of the station. Weston had obviously given his orders to Patterson, who was shaking hands with him as he left.
I should have turned and kept walking. I shouldn’t have spoken.
Fuck it, I thought. Leading Fearghal to the car and handing Linda my keys, I made my way back across to the station.
‘I want the Rivers Agency to test the water in the Carrowcreel,’ I said, standing in front of the two men. ‘I believe they’ll find pollutants in the river coming from his goldmine.’
‘I want to hump that wee girl that works over in the café there,’ Patterson said, nodding towards the building opposite. ‘But it’s not going to happen, is it?’ He laughed forcedly and turned to Weston, encouraging him to share his joke.
Weston, however, was not smiling. ‘That’s a serious allegation,’ he said. ‘Have you any proof?’
‘Janet Moore knew it. I believe that she and Leon Bradley were gathering the evidence to prove it.’
‘It’s fucking nonsense,’ Patterson interrupted. ‘Is this what you had Gorman checking post-mortem results for?’
My surprise must have shown.
‘Do you think she’d go running behind my back for the likes of you? She came in and told me the minute you asked,’ he said.
‘I want this done before I return to work on Monday, Harry,’ I persisted, regardless.
‘You think you’ll be back on Monday, do you?’ he asked, smiling. ‘I think another week or two yet must be needed to really hammer the message home.’ With that he stepped closer to me and mouthed the words carefully. ‘You’re not fucking wanted here.’
I nodded my head. ‘You told Karl Moore that his wife was having an affair.’
Patterson stopped moving. His eyelids drooped a little, hooding his expression. ‘What are you slabbering about?’
‘You told Karl Moore about his wife and Leon. He killed her days later. To my mind, that makes you responsible.’
‘You’re full of shite,’ Patterson spat.
‘We’ll see,’ I said. ‘When Moore wakes up, we’ll find out. I’m betting he’ll tell us what you said to him at football on Thursday night.’
‘She couldn’t keep her mouth shut – or her legs,’ Patterson hissed. ‘Not my fault he topped the bitch.’
‘Actually, I think it is, Harry,’ I said. ‘You gave him a motive.’
‘Fuck off,’ Patterson said, though the comment lacked his earlier conviction.
‘I want results by Monday, Harry,’ I said. ‘We’ll sort out the rest later.’
I turned and strode across the street, half expecting some final comment to be thrown behind me, but none came.
I got into the car and fired the ignition.
‘Is everything all right?’ Linda asked, leaning in from the back seat where Fearghal l
ay slumped against her.
‘Not by a mile,’ I muttered, glancing once more at where Patterson and Weston stood in the gathering darkness.
Chapter Eighteen
Thursday, 19 October
Next morning I drove to Janet Moore’s house. If I could at least see an envelope, or perhaps even catch the postman, I might learn what Leon Bradley had posted to her.
By eleven o’clock the postman had yet to arrive, and one of the Moores’ neighbours had evidently grown suspicious, for a PSNI jeep pulled up beside me.
Jim Hendry rolled down the window of the jeep and leant out. ‘I thought it might have been you. What the fuck are you planning on doing? You’ve no key.’
‘I was going to mug the postman,’ I joked.
‘You’re too late,’ Hendry replied – except from his expression it was clear that he wasn’t joking.
‘What?’ I said.
‘You’re too late. Someone knocked him down this morning on his way out the Derry Road on his bike. Clipped him with a car.’
‘Did he see who did it?’
‘Some guy with a pony-tail,’ he said. ‘Got out to help him up, then grabbed his post-bag and drove off.’
‘Pony Tail again?’ I said. Things were starting to take shape. But how did Pony Tail fit in with Eligius?
‘Now don’t start seeing conspiracies,’ Hendry said, tossing me a cigarette from the jeep window before lighting one himself. ‘It might have been a genuine accident.’
‘Except they stole his bloody post-bag,’ I argued. Then I realized the full impact of the theft. ‘So, we’ll never know what Leon Bradley found in Eligius. Someone beat us to it.’
Hendry nodded his head. ‘Almost,’ he said, his moustache twitching above his smile. He lifted a brown envelope off the dashboard and handed it to me. It was stamped with the Eligius logo and Janet Moore’s address was written on it by hand.
‘How did you get this?’ I asked.
‘I went to the Sorting Office last night. Explained that the woman in question was murdered and that.’
The envelope had already been opened. ‘What’s in here?’ I asked.
‘I wouldn’t be getting my hopes up,’ Hendry said. ‘A bunch of figures. Shipping orders. Productivity reports. Nothing anyone could make head nor tail of.’
I opened the envelope and took out the sheaf of documents inside. Hendry was right. Several pages listed productivity percentages over several months, with abbreviations at the top of the page above each column: Ag, Au, Cu, Fe. The next sheet listed shipping orders over the previous year. The name on the invoice was V M Haulage.
As I was replacing the documents in the envelope, my mobile rang. The number on the screen had a Northern prefix. When I answered, a man’s voice snapped, ‘Who’s this?’
‘You called me,’ I said. ‘Who’s this?’
‘Is your name Devlin?’ the man demanded.
‘Who the hell is this?’
‘This is Sergeant Burke. I’m a PSNI officer in Omagh. We’ve arrested a woman for soliciting. She had your phone number.’
‘Who is she?’
‘We don’t know. She doesn’t seem to be able to speak English. She gave us a card with your number to phone.’
‘I’m on my way,’ I said, turning my key in the ignition.
Hendry agreed to contact Burke for me while I drove to Omagh. I had pulled out of the estate and started up the road when I realized that I had forgotten to return the Eligius envelope to Jim.
The sky was already greying with the threat of rain as I drove up the Omagh Road. It took me some time to find the PSNI station and then I had to wait for a further ten minutes for Burke to appear. I began to realize that I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, and the realization brought with it a craving for food.
Burke was a young sergeant, which may have explained his supercilious phone manner. His hair was long, his face darkened with designer stubble. He continually ran his hand through his hair and flicked his head to the side while we spoke. As he led me to the cell where Natalia was being held, he explained how they had come to arrest her.
They had been working on a tip-off. A local clergyman had been told by one of his congregation that foreign girls were working the street corners in one of the rougher areas of town. Cars were stopping and picking them up, then leaving them off again fifteen minutes later. It didn’t take Holmesian deduction to work out what was going on.
Burke and three other plain-clothes officers had staked out the street. There had been three girls working. Two of them had made a run for it when they saw the police coming, recognizing them for what they were, even in plain clothes. Only Natalia had been arrested.
‘She didn’t even try to run away,’ Burke snorted.
‘Maybe she wanted to get caught,’ I suggested.
‘Huh?’ He looked at me sceptically, one eyebrow raised, his lip curled slightly. ‘Now why would she want to do that?’
He pushed open the door of the interview room. Natalia looked significantly older than the last time I had seen her. She wore a tight white T-shirt and a frayed denim skirt that barely passed her crotch. Her arms were purple with bruises and her hair hung in straggles over her face. The yellowed remains of a bruise shadowed her left eye. She had wrapped one arm across her breasts.
‘Jesus Christ,’ I said.
She looked up, her eyes flinty, her jaw set. When she saw me her expression softened for a second and her mouth twitched in recognition, as if she would smile. Then, as if remembering that I was the one who had been responsible for her fate, her expression hardened once more and she looked away.
I went over and knelt in front of her chair, placing my hands on her shoulders, though she shrugged them away. I moved my head in the hope of catching her eye, but she avoided me.
‘I’m so sorry,’ I said. ‘Jesus, I’m so sorry.’
Finally she turned and looked at me. Something inside her seemed to crack. Her nose twitched suddenly and her eyes filled with tears. She spluttered something in Chechen, and hit at me with her fists, the blows glancing off my shoulders and the side of my head. I knelt in front of her and let her strike me, until her tears had subsided. Then I drew her against me and held her tight. Initially she felt rigid in my arms, but then she relaxed and returned the embrace.
‘I see now why she had your card,’ Burke said.
‘Shut the fuck up,’ I snapped, without looking at him.
Burke left and his superior came in, an inspector named Charlie Gilmore.
‘You were a bit sharp with Peter,’ he said.
‘Is that so?’
Gilmore nodded. ‘He’s young. No need to be rude with him. You’re off your turf here.’
‘This isn’t about turf; it’s about dealing with people like we’re all part of the same species.’
‘Oh, we know we’re all part of the same species, all right. What we’re a bit more confused about though is where exactly she’s from. My money’s on Russian.’ He nodded slightly, as if this piece of information might influence my response.
‘She’s Chechen. Her name’s Natalia Almurzayev,’ I said.
‘And how do you know her?’ he asked, scraping back the chair from the opposite side of the table to us and sitting down.
‘Her husband was shot in Lifford three weeks ago.’
He nodded. ‘The bank job; the guy with the plastic pistol.’
‘That’s right.’
‘The wife’s attempt at crime hasn’t been much more successful,’ he chuckled. ‘So, how do we speak to her?’
An hour later, Karol Walshyk was brought into the interview room. Someone had rustled up a plate of sandwiches and some tea. I had attempted to communicate with Natalia several times, but to little avail. She repeated the word ‘good’ as she ate, and smiled forcedly. The smile that greeted Karol’s arrival, though, was genuine, and for a second I saw a hint of the woman she must have been before setting foot in Ireland.
Karol’s reaction was one of b
oth shock and pity. He spoke to her immediately in Chechen, ignoring the rest of us in the room. Finally, seemingly satisfied with her responses, he stood beside her, her hand in his, and faced us.
Gilmore came in with Burke. Instinctively I lifted the chair that had been left for me beside the PSNI officers and moved it to the side of the table, next to Natalia.
Gilmore inserted two fresh tapes into the tape recorder attached to the desk and turned it on. He then stated the date and time, introduced each person in the room, and commenced the interview.
‘Can you explain to us what you were doing when you were arrested?’ he asked.
On the night I had taken her from the house in Strabane she had gone to a local fast-food restaurant with Helen Gorman. Gorman had told her she had to leave her for a few moments, after I called her to assist in following Pony Tail’s car. An hour later she had not returned and Natalia had started to worry that something bad had happened. Then the waitress had approached her table to warn her that the group of young boys in the corner were looking over at her. One of them, dressed in a tracksuit, his hair dyed blond, had called something over at her, something that caused his friends to snigger. His expression left her in little doubt as to his meaning.
Frightened, she had left the restaurant, fearful that the boys would follow her. She had walked up the bypass, making her way back to the house. By the time she arrived, her friends were in a panic. Angered by her absence, the pony-tailed man had warned he would return the following night. If she didn’t have the money by then, the other people in the house would have to pay it for her.
She would think of something, she had promised them. She would ask the policeman to help.
At that point, the front door had been flung open. Pony Tail made straight for her, his mouth an angry slash. He grabbed her by the hair and slammed her face against the wall. He called her names. ‘Bitch,’ she said. ‘Bitch.’
Bleed a River Deep (Inspector Devlin Mystery 3) Page 13