Beneath the Surface

by Jo Spain

  ‘That friendship was short-lived,’ she commented. ‘Do you want to talk about it?’

  ‘Ha. The man’s a consummate liar.’

  ‘What’s your theory?’

  ‘You show me yours.’

  Linda smiled.

  ‘This is like one of those flash analysis exams we used to do for fun in college. Okay, I’m thinking on my feet here, and I don’t know as much as you about this Udforske gang, so go easy, darling, but here’s my guess: this fellow Reid’s head is raised above the parapet in Udforske after he becomes a Ulysses hero. He stays in the company for a while, continues to do well, but is moving on to other pastures. Maybe he’s telling the truth and he wanted to start his own business, harvesting seaweed. But there’s not as much money in a start-up, especially not in recession-hit Ireland. And according to the file you gave me, he did wait until the recession to begin his business, oddly. He has a few lost years after he left Udforske. Didn’t work in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005. We’ll call them his tobacco research years. He only started with this thing in 2006 and it wasn’t listed as a company until 2007.

  ‘So, perhaps he encountered money problems. And perhaps he contacted his former employer, Mr Madsen, who doesn’t need a safety officer but does require someone for a clean-up job. Reid knows how to handle a gun, he’s loyal to Udforske and willing to take on any job to pay for his new business. Including shooting a man dead. How am I doing?’

  ‘Okay,’ Tom said. ‘You’ve a flair for this. But did you notice any blemishes on Reid’s record, Sherlock?’

  ‘No. There was nothing there to indicate he’s capable of any kind of violence. In his file anyway.’

  ‘Kind of blows a hole in your hypothesis. Hero turns killer for cash. Hardly plausible. Close, but no cigar, Columbo.’

  ‘Good Lord, Tom, can’t you name a female detective? Ever heard of Miss Marple?’

  Tom contemplated the file in his hand, the background material they’d managed to pull together on Reid.

  ‘Yet he was in that bar on Friday night and so was Madsen. Ray’s on to the Danish police at the moment. Reid lived there for a few years before working on that rig. His record’s clean in Ireland, but there’s something he’s not telling us.’

  ‘I would agree.’

  Tom thought of something. He opened the file in front of him and scanned the contents again, as he had done shortly before Reid’s arrival.

  There it was.

  ‘You look all animated. What is it?’ Linda asked.

  ‘Reid said they were all inebriated on Friday night.’

  ‘He did.’

  ‘That merit award he got. There’s an article in here about it. There was a party on the Ulysses that night for the crew and that’s how things nearly got out of hand. The drilling operation wasn’t fully manned when everything went pear-shaped. But a couple of safety officers and one or two crew members managed to get everything under control before the Ulysses could light up the night sky.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And Reid was at the party. But luckily, he was sober.’

  Linda paused for a moment.

  ‘Ahhhh,’ she said, the light dawning. ‘I saw the article. Damien Reid is a recovered alcoholic. The piece was all about his triumph over adversity.’

  ‘Yes. He got on the wagon in 1990. The company had all that on his record because he barely passed the necessary criteria to be a safety officer. One of the things they look for is a clean bill of health – physical and mental. His dedication to sobriety won over in the end. So, it would be a bit odd if he was downing pints last Friday, don’t you think?’

  Linda nodded.

  ‘Yes. Very odd indeed.’

  *

  ‘We know for a fact you re-entered Government Buildings on Friday evening. You lied to the police, Ms Brady, which is a criminal offence in itself. I strongly suggest you tell us the truth now.’

  Laura kept her tone even. She was attempting to go in easy, sensing if they went too hard at Grace Brady she’d clam up out of spite. But it was difficult.

  Grace glared at her inquisitor, her eyes narrowed in dislike. She turned to Michael, ignoring Laura.

  ‘I remember now. I had left my bag in my office and ran back in to get it. Silly me.’

  ‘No,’ Laura sighed. ‘You didn’t. The CCTV footage captured you going back in with your bag on your arm. Grace, this is serious. Now, I’ll ask you again, what time did you leave the complex?’

  The woman raised an eyebrow and continued to pick at the skin around her nails. They were in her apartment, a one-bed poky affair near Fairview Park. Grace was on extended sick leave from her job, allegedly because of the stress caused by the events of Friday evening. Laura had noted the gym bag dumped in the hall and Grace was in workout gear. She was clearly exercising through her anxiety.

  ‘This is harassment. It’s six days since he was murdered and you still haven’t arrested anyone. Yet, you’re here annoying me, and I’m on sick leave. I’m going to complain to your boss. And to Shane Morrison. He won’t be happy to know you’re upsetting me.’

  ‘We are on the verge of arresting someone,’ Michael said.

  ‘Yeah? Who?’

  ‘You. If you don’t amend your statement and give us a truthful account of your movements on Friday night, we will arrest you for obstructing the course of justice.’

  ‘You wouldn’t dare.’

  ‘As you rightly point out, everyone is waiting for us to bring someone in and our boss gave us clear instructions to charge you. My colleague and I are affording you as much leeway as you can hope for, but if you can’t give us a rational explanation for your behaviour, you are in a lot of trouble.’

  Grace’s eyes started to water.

  ‘I want to talk to the other detective, the one she brought with her to my sister’s house.’

  Laura coolly examined her own fingernails. How predictable. Ray hadn’t been any kinder to Grace, but he was better looking than Michael.

  ‘Sure. We can bring you down to the station. Detective Lennon will be busy until later, but I’m sure you won’t mind waiting in the custody suite. He should be free before the evening is out.’

  Grace’s eyes flicked between the two detectives before settling on Laura, the lesser of two evils in this instance.

  ‘Fine,’ she said. ‘Fine, fine, fine.’

  Laura leaned forward, all ears.

  ‘I went back in to warn Ryan.’

  ‘Warn him about what?’

  ‘I knew he was up to something. He and Aidan had a falling out and Ryan was planning something. I heard them shouting in Aidan’s office. I couldn’t hear exactly what they were saying but I heard Ryan say he would do something to hurt Aidan. I don’t know what.

  ‘He’d been away for a few months; Ryan didn’t realise that Minister Blake was no longer his pal. He’s no one’s pal. The only thing he cares about is his career. He uses people, then discards them when he’s finished. I wanted to tell Ryan to think carefully about his actions.’

  ‘And did you?’

  ‘No. He was gone by the time I got back to the office.’

  ‘Why didn’t you just ring him?’ Michael said. ‘You’d left the building at that stage. Why the sense of urgency?’

  Grace twitched.

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe I had a premonition or something.’

  ‘Did you speak to anybody?’

  There was a tiny hesitation before Grace’s answer.

  ‘No.’

  ‘And what time did you leave?’

  ‘Just before 10 p.m. I didn’t go out through Government Buildings. I took the Kildare Street exit from Leinster House so I could pick up dinner in Marks and Sparks.’

  ‘You didn’t leave until 10? What were you doing until then?’

  ‘Nothing. Just . . . sitting in the office.’

  Laura studied the other woman, her mind spinning with possibilities. Not having an alibi was insufficient cause to charge her with Ryan’s murder, regardless of
Tom’s angry throwaway remark earlier.

  Ray had been right, though. Grace Brady was still hiding something from them.

  The question was, what?

  Chapter 22

  Tom had tried to get hold of Carl Madsen several times, first on his mobile, then through his company headquarters. In the end he left a curt message with the man’s secretary demanding the vice-president ring him immediately.

  Having failed to make contact, the inspector instead summoned the Galway TD Jarlath O’Keefe to headquarters. The man, inadvertently or not, had given all his guests in Leinster House an alibi for Friday night, among them the less than truthful Damien Reid.

  O’Keefe was waiting for him in the interview room, his foot tapping nervously on the floor. Tom recognised him instantly, not from any previous encounter, but because of the younger man’s larger than life moustache. It was such an unusual feature, trimmed as it was in a bizarre handlebar fashion.

  It was a clever way, Tom thought, for the backbench government TD to stand out. Throw in his dapper pinstripe suit and the man cut quite a striking figure. The downside was it was difficult to take him seriously.

  ‘You know why I asked you to come in,’ Tom said. The inspector was alone. He’d offered Linda the opportunity to sit in on the meeting with O’Keefe but she’d declined with a rather half-baked excuse. He had thought it odd, but didn’t press her.

  O’Keefe gave an embarrassed grin. Underneath the moustache, he was a handsome man, with amiable, open features.

  ‘I have an idea why,’ the TD answered. ‘I think you may have had a word with one of the bartenders from Friday night and he might have told you about the state I was in. When your guys interviewed me I said I’d been keeping a close eye on all my guests that evening, when clearly I was not in an entirely professional state. My PA tells me I sang the entirety of “The Fields of Athenry” with my eyes squeezed shut, so that’s a fair few minutes at least when I wasn’t watching the group.’

  Tom raised an eyebrow. The other man seemed to think this was all a big joke.

  O’Keefe waited for Tom to say something, then, realising the charm offensive wasn’t going to work, changed tack.

  He adopted a solemn demeanour.

  ‘I am sorry, Inspector, that I wasn’t more forthcoming in my first interview. I’m afraid the reality and gravity of what had happened didn’t dawn on me immediately. It seemed so utterly ludicrous. My instinct was not, “How can I best help with this investigation?” It was, “Oh crap. I was responsible for seven people last night. Seven potential witnesses and I was as pissed as a fart.” I know it sounds awful, but I was putting my reputation above the important work you have to do.’

  ‘I appreciate you saying that, Deputy,’ the inspector said. ‘And I can understand you were embarrassed to admit you were drunk in charge. Now all the cards are on the table, let’s start at the beginning, shall we? This group you brought to the Dáil. Why were they there?’

  O’Keefe relaxed his shoulders.

  ‘They’re from my constituency in Galway,’ he said. ‘They’ve got this great company, converting seaweed to fertiliser. I invited them to make a cross-party presentation in the audio-visual room on the sustainable and economic benefits of the business. Fascinating stuff.’

  ‘So you invited them? Nobody approached you and requested you bring them to the Dáil?’

  The TD screwed up his eyes in concentration as he tried to recall the exact circumstances of the invite being extended.

  ‘I had met a couple of the fellows before, when we were canvassing during the election. They asked if I could organise a trip to Leinster House. I said I would bring them up when the new government was formed. I determined the date. I wasn’t contacted about any specific time or even month. Last Friday suited my calendar commitments. It wasn’t ideal. Most of my colleagues go home on a Thursday evening, but as it happened there were enough people around that day for me to fill a room for a half hour. Probably because of that charity event. I arranged a tour of the House that afternoon and then brought the group to the bar.’

  ‘Had you met Damien Reid before?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you know him well?’

  ‘Only in a business capacity and I wouldn’t say well. He seems a likeable chap.’

  Yes, Tom thought. That had been his initial impression, too.

  ‘Was he drinking on Friday night?’

  O’Keefe shook his head.

  ‘I can categorically say that he wasn’t. I paid for all the drinks. All Damien had was orange juice.’

  ‘You seem very certain of that.’

  ‘I’m positive. When I know someone in my company is stone cold sober, it tempers me somewhat. Does that make sense?’

  ‘It does, yes. But you’ve told us already that you might have lapsed in your . . . eh, hosting skills.’ That was a delicate way of putting it. ‘Could any of your guests have been absent for a period without you realising?’

  O’Keefe stroked the edges of his moustache.

  ‘I’ve given this a lot of thought since the weekend, Inspector. Yes, I’d consumed a large quantity of alcohol on Friday, but I can hold my liquor. I would never get so drunk that I would do or say anything that would jeopardise my position. I might have been economical with the truth in terms of how closely I was watching everybody, but I genuinely don’t think anybody from my group went missing for any length of time.’

  The inspector changed tack.

  ‘Did you know the man who was killed, Deputy?’

  O’Keefe shrugged.

  ‘Enough to make polite small talk with him. He gave a couple of policy briefings at party meetings. He seemed intelligent, very passionate.’

  ‘You don’t move in the same circles as Aidan Blake, then?’

  The TD smiled.

  ‘I’m just a lowly backbencher, Inspector. Aidan Blake has a halo and glides on water. He condescends to give me a polite word and a handshake when he’s passing, but that’s the extent of it.’

  ‘Are you in the O’Shea camp, then?’ Tom continued. ‘You’re not aligned with those who would like to see Minister Blake become the next Taoiseach?’

  O’Keefe shifted uncomfortably, as if he feared there might be a camera in the room recording his answer.

  ‘You can speak freely,’ Tom said. ‘I’m only latterly aware of your party’s inner workings; I haven’t taken a side yet.’ He smiled, to show he intended the exchange to be informal.

  The twinkle was back in O’Keefe’s eye.

  ‘Cormac O’Shea gets a hard time in the media and sometimes for good reason,’ he said. ‘But he didn’t get where he is without knowing how to foster loyalty among the rank and file. He’s done an excellent job of building the party and leading us to where we are now. But he’s not Taoiseach material. He’s a parish-pump politician, not a statesman. There are a number of us, myself included, who acknowledge that public opinion will necessitate a heave at some point, because Cormac won’t go willingly.

  ‘The difference is, my group doesn’t believe party apparatchiks like our chair, Darragh McNally, should dictate who the next leader will be. It should happen organically, from the grass roots. Designating Blake as Taoiseach-in-waiting has done him no favours. He might be popular with the red tops and Ireland’s housewives, but he carries little weight with the party membership. He doesn’t travel to see them or go out of his way to engage with them. Blake is the sort who asks you how you are but looks over your shoulder as you reply, seeking the next person to impress. He’s an empty vessel.’

  Tom tried to hide his surprise. In the space of a few minutes, O’Keefe had risen in his estimation from a genial, publicity-seeking politician of the average kind to an astute, insightful and potentially cunning operator.

  Impressive.

  ‘Would you have reservations, then, about the direction the party would take with Blake at the helm? What about this legislation he’s producing to do with the energy sector?’ he asked.
r />   O’Keefe scoffed.

  ‘My cosying up to the environmental sector is not just about winning votes, Inspector. I have very definite opinions on that Bill. But I know damn well it has senior figures in the party behind it. Blake is just their organ grinder. Not that he sees himself in that role.’

  Tom hesitated, an idea forming.

  ‘Has the Bill been presented to the Reform Party backbenchers by the cabinet yet?’ he asked.

  O’Keefe pursed his lips.

  ‘No. It hasn’t. Apparently it’s receiving the final flourishes and we will be briefed on it imminently. Then we’ll be instructed to toe the party line and vote accordingly.’

  ‘How have you formed such a fixed opinion, then,’ Tom asked, ‘if you haven’t seen it yet?’

  ‘I didn’t say I hadn’t seen it, Inspector. Just that it hasn’t been presented to us yet.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Tom observed the man. ‘By any chance do you know Linda McCarn? The criminal psychologist?’

  O’Keefe grinned.

  ‘Everybody knows Linda. A wonderfully engaging woman, don’t you think? I’m a big fan.’

  Tom smiled. He suspected he now knew the source of Linda’s leaked information. Always keep in with the little people, she was fond of saying. Fate had led him to meet with Jarlath O’Keefe. And that was why Linda had avoided this interview, so she wouldn’t give anything away. Well, he’d got there anyway.

  Tom stood up to signal the interview was over and thanked O’Keefe for his time.

  The house of cards really was collapsing for Aidan Blake.

  *

  They should have demanded Skype. In the absence of an interview room format, the inspector would have settled for a video link so he could observe Madsen as the man answered questions. Over the phone, Tom had no way of judging whether or not the man was telling the truth. It was like playing cards with your eyes closed.

  ‘You could plan another jaunt, this time to Denmark.’ Sean McGuinness had been remarkably unsympathetic.

  ‘It’s a bloody murder inquiry. I know that man has lied to us and I’m conducting his second interview over the phone,’ Tom griped.