Ask No Questions

by Claire Allan

  ‘At the start, he’d go there every day. For hours. He’d bring a book and read to her, you know. Buy her some of the toys she wanted, the dolls and teddies, and put them on her grave. When the snow fell that year, I had to wrestle a blanket from him. “She’ll be cold,” he told me. “It’s too cold up there.”

  ‘He had a breakdown, you know. Ended up in Gransha for a spell. The “madhouse” as he called it. I remember being jealous of him, that he got to escape it all for a while. They had him so doped up he didn’t know his own name, while I was left trying to pick up the pieces. With three boys who didn’t have a clue what was going on and that trial coming up. There’s days I wonder how I’m still standing at all.’

  I look at the fragile, broken figure sitting opposite me. I know she’s just existing. She stopped living the same time Kelly did.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Ingrid

  Thursday, 24 October 2019

  On Thursday morning I pick up my car before work and I’m glad to do so. The mechanic has done a good job and even though I’d rather be spending my money on something nice instead of paying for a respray and new window, I feel comforted to get back behind the wheel.

  I drive the short distance to the City Cemetery and sit for a while, trying to take in all that I have heard over the last few days. The interview with Bernie Doherty has got under my skin and my sleep last night was fitful at best.

  There is an air of sadness hanging over me. I am not made of stone. I cannot escape the feeling that I’m now somehow touched by their pain, too – that it has been added to the mountain of tragic stories I’ve heard over the years that now keep me awake at night. Not that I wasn’t touched by what happened to Kelly all those years ago anyway. We all were.

  The streets we used to play on remained deserted for months. At school, there was a silence that was never there before. I remember seeing a teacher, Miss McDowell, crying in the corridor. There was a special assembly, where we were told it was okay to be sad. It was okay to miss Kelly. And then a policeman told us all about stranger danger and what to do if anyone tried to kidnap us.

  I was terrified. We all were, I think. Terrified of every car or van that passed us. Terrified of the dark. Terrified each time we passed the framed picture of Kelly that had been erected outside the principal’s office and were reminded of what had happened.

  I shake my head to try to focus on what I’m doing. I have a vague idea where she is buried. Towards the far wall, close to the edge of the maze of pathways that wind down the hill from Creggan to the Brandywell. The graves in this part of the cemetery are well settled now. Mostly just a long line of frost-covered lawn, occasional floral arrangements or ornaments showing them to be well-tended, their inhabitants still loved and missed.

  It doesn’t take me long to spot Kelly’s grave – the tall angelic figure, chiselled out of white marble, glistening as if she has been freshly hewn. The gold lettering that spells out her name has been retouched, Bernie told me. Fixed up for her anniversary. They retouch it every few years. Liam takes cleaning cloths and spray to the cemetery with him at least once a week to make sure the stone is kept sparkling. Looking at it now, I wonder how on earth they had been able to afford such a stone. ‘Debt and danger’ probably, as my mum used to say.

  Bernie had told me, ‘You know, we had all these hopes and dreams for her and in the end, all we can do for her is make sure her resting place is well-tended. So we do that.’

  Kelly Doherty

  1986 – 1994

  Taken from us

  Beloved daughter, sister & granddaughter

  Be Not Afraid

  Instantly the words and the tune of the hymn ‘Be Not Afraid’ come back to me. I remember it was sung at Kelly’s funeral. I had wondered if she had been afraid. I’m sure she had been. Even then there was something about the reassurance that God was with you in your most trying times that didn’t ring true.

  I felt it even more now, after listening to Bernie Doherty tell me how she’d had to listen to her daughter’s injuries outlined in a cold, methodical manner. As if it hadn’t been her baby girl who had died but instead just a collection of bones and muscles and organs.

  ‘He took her humanity away,’ Bernie had told me. ‘When he killed her. You know. He took away so much, but what I can’t forgive him for is taking away the very sense of who she was. She wasn’t my wee girl, who would roar laughing watching Mr Bean, or who would constantly be on at me to save the empty toilet roll tubes and milk cartons and to buy her poster paint so she could make some monstrosity she’d seen on Art Attack.

  ‘Nobody cared that she loved being read to still each night. That writer, you know. The famous one …’ She’d paused for a moment or so as if trying to pull a name from the depths of her memories. ‘Dahl!’ she’d said triumphantly. ‘That Roald Dahl. She loved him.

  ‘And nobody cared that she still sucked her thumb sometimes when she was really tired, or that her favourite dessert was Viennetta. All people knew, and cared about, after she died was what that Jamesy Harte had done to her. If he’d touched her. Done things, you know.’

  I’d nodded because I did know. I knew that some signs, abrasions and bruising, had been found on Kelly Doherty’s legs, but there was no evidence she’d been sexually assaulted. No evidence of penetration.

  ‘The thought that they’d had to check, examine her private parts, even in an autopsy, made me feel she’d been violated anyway. I know that’s irrational, but I can’t help it,’ Bernie had told me.

  ‘Then, how they spoke about her. She became a collection of bruises and fractures. She was so much more than that.’

  At the time, I’d been shielded from the worst of the information about how Kelly died. All I’d known was that a bad man had killed her. He’d hurt her. Then I’d been told it was Jamesy Harte and I remember how that seemed so strange to me, because the Jamesy I knew wasn’t a bad man.

  Kelly’s face stares out from a picture on her stone. It’s the same picture that hangs in the Dohertys’ living room. I don’t know why, but I’m suddenly overcome with the urge to reach out and touch it – so I do, and then I trace my finger along the golden letters spelling out her name and I close my eyes.

  A memory comes to me. It had been raining that day, although it had stopped by the time we went out to collect our nuts and apples. My mother had asked me did I want to wear my welly boots to keep my feet dry – but no. I hadn’t wanted to. Princesses don’t wear welly boots, I’d reasoned, so I’d slipped my feet into my black patent school shoes and left before my mother could force me to change.

  I’d been running down the street, away from someone or something, when my foot landed square in the middle of a wide puddle, which was deeper than it had appeared. Ice-cold water and silt had splashed up around me, soaking my foot through my shoes and dirtying my socks. I was flung forwards, dangerously close to losing my grip on my plastic shopping bag which, by then, was half full.

  I remember that I’d put my hand out to block my fall – the same hand I was now using to stroke the letters of Kelly’s name. It had landed, palm down, onto the wet, gritty road. I can still feel the burn and sting as a layer of skin was scraped from my body, tiny stones embedding themselves into my flesh.

  I remember scrambling to my feet. The shouts of ‘Stop!’ and ‘Raid!’ and ‘Hurry Up!’ and ‘No!’ ringing in my ears, bouncing off the houses around me. I didn’t have time to think about the pain or the cold. I didn’t have time to think about how my wet sock was now slipping into my shoe.

  Righting myself, I had run on and I hadn’t looked back to see who was shouting. I’ve never thought about it. Not until now. My memory is too faded to try to distinguish the voices. Male, female, adult or child. Was it Kelly who shouted ‘No!’?

  I take out my phone, step back and take some pictures of the stone, of the fresh flowers, the small teddy bear ornament that adorns the grave. The snaps on my phone won’t do the story justice, so I make a mental note
to arrange for a professional photographer to take pictures of Kelly’s grave for the book I’ll write. As well as a picture of Declan. Niall. Of the Doherty house. Our old school. Jamesy? Will Jamesy want his photo taken now, trying as he is to conceal his identity?

  I decide that when I get home, I’ll start making proper plans for the book. Start planning the structure, now that I can see it starting to come together. Once I have an outline, I can approach my publisher to see if they are interested, but I already know they will be. This has everything. Grief, fear, pain, destroyed lives, a possible miscarriage of justice.

  I feel the little flutter of excitement that comes at the beginning of a project. It takes over, for the moment at least, from the feeling that I might just be a little too close to this story.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Ingrid

  ‘The wanderer returns,’ Ryan announces as I walk back into the newsroom.

  He is holding court in the middle of the room, notepad and pen in hand, no doubt brainstorming with my colleagues about tomorrow’s edition.

  ‘I was starting to wonder if you still worked here. You left yesterday lunchtime and we’re only seeing you now?’

  It has just gone ten in the morning. Ryan’s tone is light, but the expression on his face is anything but. If looks could kill, I’d be a corpse on the floor right now. I’ve no doubt that any number of my colleagues have picked up on it, too. Tommy gives me a sympathetic nod.

  ‘I was out with the Doherty family yesterday,’ I tell him. ‘For the anniversary piece. I thought it best to take my time and do a good job. I didn’t leave ’til almost five, so I thought I’d just go on home. This morning I was at the cemetery, getting pictures of her grave for the story.’

  ‘Oh, I bet that was tough,’ Trina says, always one to try to calm any incoming storm.

  ‘Yes, well it was. Their grief is still very raw. More at the moment, of course. Given the anniversary. But Bernie was very open and honest. It’s powerful stuff.’

  ‘Sounds like front-page stuff,’ Trina says.

  ‘I’m the editor here and I make the decisions,’ Ryan says brusquely. ‘Write me a lead piece and a feature for four and five. Keep it focused on Kelly, not on who is responsible. We want heart, not blame. Let’s not give Jamesy Harte any more attention.’

  ‘Not even if Bernie Doherty has said she’ll never find it in her heart to forgive him?’ I ask.

  ‘I don’t want him mentioned outside of outlining the facts as they stand. He was convicted of her murder and served seventeen years in prison. No more and no less.’

  ‘Really? Nothing at all?’ I raise an eyebrow. It’s a strange approach, to put it mildly.

  ‘Don’t question me, Ingrid. Just write your piece.’

  ‘I’m on it,’ I tell him, trying not to sound too annoyed.

  ‘Well done, Ingrid. On getting the scoop,’ Trina chimes in, and I offer her a smile of gratitude.

  ‘Yes, good job, Ingrid,’ Ryan mutters dismissively, and I bristle.

  I’d rather feel ignored by him than patronised.

  ‘The pictures on my phone are okay,’ I add. ‘But it might be worth blowing the budget to get one of the freelance guys out to take some decent shots.’

  He nods. ‘I’ll have a look at what you’ve got then decide,’ he says.

  I already know that despite the significance of the story, he won’t dare eat into his precious budget.

  ‘I’ll email them through when we’re done here,’ I tell him.

  ‘Actually, Ingrid,’ he says, nodding in the direction of his office, ‘why don’t you nip in and show them to me now. We can chat about the interview as well. Try to plan the best way to approach it.’

  Suppressing the urge to roll my eyes, I lift my phone and notebook and follow him through to his office. I’m starting to hate spending time in here, especially when there is no one else with me to act as a buffer.

  As he sits down, I open the screen on my phone and scroll through my gallery of pictures to find the snapshots I took earlier.

  ‘You’ve your car back,’ he says.

  ‘I do. Thank God. I picked it up this morning.’

  ‘I hope it wasn’t too expensive. Clutches can be pricy.’

  ‘It was grand. Stuck it on my credit card.’

  ‘Shame you couldn’t claim it on your insurance. Would’ve saved you a few quid.’

  ‘Yes, but sure, that’s life, isn’t it?’

  ‘I suppose. If only it had been, you know, vandalised at work instead. You know, maybe with a slur spray painted on the bonnet. I imagine that the insurance would have covered it then.’

  I’m at a loss for words. My brain can’t think fast enough to come up with an acceptable retort.

  ‘So, the police called me yesterday afternoon, said they wanted to come and take pictures of the car park, check our lighting – stuff like that. I hadn’t a clue what they were talking about. Can you imagine my surprise when they tell me it’s part of the ongoing investigation into the targeted harassment of one of my own reporters? The one whose car was vandalised in our car park.’

  I colour. ‘I didn’t want you worrying,’ I lie. ‘It’s not a big deal.’

  ‘Not a big deal? Someone breaks into your flat and daubs a threat on the wall. And someone attacks your car at work and it’s not a big deal?’

  ‘I’m dealing with it. It’s not affecting my work, so I didn’t see any need to fill you in.’

  ‘You took Tuesday off and now you’re telling me it’s not affecting your work? C’mon, Ingrid. Why can’t you just admit this is bigger than you? Do you actually not care that you are putting yourself in danger’s way?’

  ‘We both know that threats come with the territory,’ I tell him, looking him directly in the eye.

  ‘Of course. Badly written letters. Poisonous emails, perhaps, or the odd drunk shouting abuse in the street. But this, Ingrid? You’re an intelligent woman – or at least I thought you were. This is a dangerous escalation.’

  ‘It honestly doesn’t bother me,’ I lie, trying to still the jittery feeling growing in my stomach, threatening to spread out around my body, making my legs jiggle or my eye twitch. ‘We can’t be intimidated into not running a story.’

  ‘But we’re not running the story, Ingrid. We’re not going to talk to Jamesy Harte. I’ve made that clear. I want the piece for tomorrow written as straight as you can make it. Not a single mention of Harte’s campaign to have his name cleared. I will be editing it myself, so God help you if I see anything that shouldn’t be there …’

  I want to tell him to go to hell. If we were anywhere else but in this office, I would do.

  ‘Maybe if you listened to what Jamesy had to say, you’d change your mind about him. People don’t always get it right, you know. The law doesn’t always get it right. If you heard what he told me, how he was set up. If you could see how broken he looks …’

  ‘See how broken he looks?’ he asks, his face darkening. ‘So you’ve seen him, then? You’ve spoken to him face to face. Surely he’s not in Derry, is he?’ He stops, looks at me directly. ‘Is that where you were on Saturday? Before you came to my place?’

  Damn it. In my fury I forgot that he doesn’t know that I met Harte. I could kick myself. I stare without speaking.

  ‘Who do you think you are?’ he says, his face reddening with anger. ‘The lead character in a John Grisham book? Leave clearing his name to his bleeding-heart campaigners and his legal team. Do your job without risking your safety and that of your colleagues. Write the stories we pay you to write!’

  He is in my face, so close I can feel his warm breath on mine. Rage is coming off him in waves, and I swear it must be contagious, because I’m angry, too. I’m so bloody angry.

  ‘I’m doing just that, writing what you tell me to,’ I shout at him, refusing to back away from his stale breath and his toxic, proprietorial masculinity. ‘But I’ll be damned if you control what I do outside working hours. You mightn’t have
had the ambition to reach beyond this paper, but we don’t all have to rot here. If I can further my career, and help a potentially innocent man, then of course I’m going to do it. So yes, I have seen him. You’re right, that is where I was on Saturday. Meeting him.’

  ‘Tell me he’s not stupid enough to have come back to Derry?’ Ryan asks.

  I shake my head. ‘He has no intention of coming back here. This city let him down. He’s living in a shitty bedsit in Portstewart, if you must know.’

  ‘He has some brains, after all,’ Ryan says.

  We sit in a silence for a moment or two. The wind has gone from our sails as quickly as it arrived.

  ‘Can I go now?’ I ask.

  ‘I need to talk to you about something else first,’ he says. ‘I’ve been on to HR.’

  I baulk, can feel the colour drain from my face.

  ‘Don’t give me that look, Ingrid. You know I had to. Any incident on the premises has to be reported straight away. There are implications. Insurance, et cetera.’

  Of course – it had to come down to money and not to the actual welfare of the employees. This time I fail to suppress the eye-roll.

  I make to leave. ‘I really do have a lot of work to do,’ I tell him, ‘so maybe we could continue this talk later?’

  He ignores me.

  ‘Ingrid, there’s to be no more lone working here after hours. They’ve been quite clear on that. You’ll have to leave with the rest of us. HR have also asked that all staff leave a note of where they are going when they leave the office and what time they expect to return. You’re to keep your work-issued mobile phone charged and switched on at all times during office hours so that you, and the rest of the staff, are immediately contactable.’

  I feel my temper flare again. ‘This is absolutely ridiculous,’ I say. ‘It’s not how this job works, and you and I know it.’

  ‘It’s how it’s going to work,’ he says sternly. ‘I had to talk them down from insisting all interviews be carried out over the phone from the office, so count yourself lucky.’