Then, shouting, hands upon him, rough, male hands, rough voices, Gaelic insults. O’Grady’s arms were twisted behind him, his head locked into a thick, stinking elbow. Trying, helplessly, to wrench himself free.
Hawthorne’s thugs. The Devlin boys—he’d know those voices anywhere. The twins, Stig and Dooley, known for their brutality and their background as amateur boxers.
And then another voice.
“Keep him in one piece, lads.”
Hawthorne’s voice. Hawthorne’s face, looming over him.
“Oh dear, oh dear, O’Grady. What have we here?”
O’Grady had looked up into the small pink eyes.
“A murder weapon?” Hawthorne had picked up a pistol from the ground. Hawthorne was wearing blue forensic latex gloves. He held the Ruger under O’Grady’s nose.
“This must be what you used to shoot the poor bugger,” Hawthorne went on.
“You won’t find my prints on that,” O’Grady had said, through lips half crushed by a tattooed forearm.
Hawthorne had laughed. “Fingerprints? You’re talking to the Chief Super, O’Grady. The Príomh-Cheannfort. What do I need with fingerprints? That’s for the little guys, the form-fillers, the fact-checkers.” He’d turned on his heel. “Stig, Dooley. Take him away. But I don’t want a mark on him—is that understood?”
O’Grady had been bundled into a windowless van. He’d been handcuffed. One of the Devlin boys had occasionally landed a punch to his ribs—“Just to make sure you behave for the boss,” they’d said.
He’d been thrown in a police cell. The next day, he’d been marched up to Hawthorne’s office.
Hawthorne had leaned back in his chair and surveyed him. “I hope they looked after you,” he’d said. “I gather the breakfasts downstairs are every bit the equal of the Gresham.” He’d laughed. O’Grady had stood tall, staring straight ahead.
“Well, O’Grady.” He’d put his hands to his waistcoat pockets. “It seems to me you’ve got a choice. You can walk out of here and promise you’ll never bother me again. Or you can be charged with the murder of Gregson Elliott. But I can’t imagine either of us wants to go through all that, do we?”
O’Grady was silent.
“What I think is, it doesn’t suit you being a Garda. Too many questions to ask. Too many unsolved mysteries. So I put it to you that it’s time you stopped. Stopped being an officer. Stopped asking questions. And in return, I’ll leave you alone. And I’ll tell these cute twins to leave you alone too.”
Stig and Dooley Devlin had appeared in the doorway. They were in identical baggy vest tops, both rubbing their tattooed forearms, up and down, in a gesture of anticipation.
“Take him away,” Hawthorne had said.
The Devlin boys had walked him down the stairs to the front door. He’d been half walked, half thrown onto the steps outside.
Ryan Fallon had been approaching the main door. “Finn—what the fuck’s the matter? You look like you’ve seen the Devil himself.”
“I think I have,” O’Grady replied. “In fact, I’m sure I have.”
Fallon had led him to the nearest café, bought him coffee, sat him down. “So, fella, tell me everything.”
So he did.
Fallon had sipped his coffee, listened in silence. Then he’d spoken. “One day, Finn. One day we will tell this story straight. We will make sure the world knows what these men have done. It may take time, but one day we will see justice done.”
Chapter 17
O’Grady looked around the wreckage of his dream home.
I caused that man’s death. But it was Hawthorne who pulled the trigger.
O’Grady heard footsteps behind him. He spun round, his hand clapped on his pistol.
Vera Joyce was walking towards him, taking careful steps along the path.
“I thought I might find you here,” she said.
“Miss Joyce—”
She smiled. “You can call me Vera if you like. We’ve known each other long enough.”
He looked at his shoes. “Just—just the way I was brought up, I guess…”
She surveyed the shell of the house in the slanting afternoon light. “Poor Mr. Elliott,” she said at last. “It was here, wasn’t it? That—”
“That he died, yes.”
“Hawthorne and his thugs,” she said. “And not one of us able to tell the truth.”
He stared at the ground.
“I knew the Devlin boys,” she said. “From my teaching. The odd thing is, they were sweet kids. Rough-hewn but gentle as puppies. They’d knock the daylights out of each other, but they’d never hurt another soul. Not then, anyway.”
“What changed them?” O’Grady asked.
“It must be the money. I can’t see why else they chose the path they did. They came from a lovely home.” She smiled. “Their mother sewed quilts—she was chairwoman of the Galway Needlecraft Guild. And their father ran the local allotments. A devoted couple. But their sons became hired criminals. They even changed their names, you know. They were christened Sebastian and Ignatius, after the saints. Good holy names. Swapped for those silly tags, as if they’re playing at being gangsters.”
He nodded.
“So much suffering,” she went on. She looked at the bare brick, the gap in the wall where the fireplace would have been. “And yet, some of us overcome our suffering.” She stood, slight in her dark gray dress. “It’s strange, isn’t it,” she said. “How some people have known great darkness in their lives and yet manage to live in the light. And others allow the darkness to engulf them. The O’Connor boys,” she said. “Stuart and Sean. Now there’s an example. Two such different paths they took. I taught them both. Their father…” She shook her head. “They should have been taken away from that house. They’d have been better off—well, anywhere else. Anywhere at all. Their father was a nasty, selfish man. He was obsessed with his collection. First World War memorabilia. He didn’t like anything to get in the way of it. He didn’t like his wife. He didn’t like his boys. Sean was a gentle soul. Stuart was that bit tougher. But that’s how Stuart managed to survive, I reckon. He went on to marry, have a child, and what a good father he was to little Bobby, a good father…” She stopped, breathed. Her eyes went to the distant trees, as if she was collecting her thoughts. “But Sean”—she turned back to O’Grady—“he behaves like someone who doesn’t trust the world to be safe. That’s why he hangs about with the tough guys. That’s why he takes refuge in money. Why, he’d sell his best friend if he thought it would earn him a few euros. ‘No one can hurt you if you’re rich,’ he used to say.”
She ran her finger along the dusty brickwork. “Ah, well. Here’s me chattering away. What I came here to say…” She looked up at him. “I came here to say, I don’t think what’s happening—these awful events—I don’t think it’s anything to do with the Green Man. It’s not that I don’t believe in the old tales—I believe in them more than anyone can know. But it’s a sideshow, in my view. There’s some real harm going on, someone evil meaning business.” She touched his arm. “That’s what I wanted to say. Evil begets evil.” She walked to the door, then turned back. “Do you know, Stuart O’Connor told me that during the beatings, his mother would stand in the kitchen singing, loudly, to drown out the boys’ screams? ‘Danny Boy,’ she’d sing.” She gave a small shudder. “And yet Stuart managed to transcend it, grow beyond it. You can never tell.”
Vera paused. “You shouldn’t blame yourself. For…” She gestured to the space around them. “For what happened here. The truth will out. I have faith that it will.” She smiled. “I must go. I took little Bobby back to his mother, but I know she wants to get on.” Vera walked away, back towards the town.
O’Grady leaned against the wall and watched her pick her way along the track until she was out of sight.
Evil begets evil.
He looked down, tried not to see the bloodstained image of his friend seared across the shadows.
It is time, he
thought. I have waited too long.
He left the old site and walked back up the hill. He found Bridie in the garden, picking blackberries. He joined her, adding handfuls of dark fruit to her basket.
After lunch, washing up with her in the kitchen, O’Grady turned to Bridie. “Tell me,” he said. “If there were no Salters, who would inherit this farm?”
She stood in the thin sunlight of the kitchen. “There’s only Jason and myself left, but if we were to go it would be my next of kin—Bobby. But until Bobby is of age…” Her voice faltered as the truth dawned. “His next of kin would hold the lease for him. It would be his uncle.”
“Sean O’Connor,” O’Grady said. “Who puts money before everything else. Who needs the land for the mill race, so he has a water supply for his golf course. With his friend Kiley MacAteer, the man who murdered your sister.”
She was trembling as she faced him. “Finn. You must warn Jason.”
“I’ve tried. He wouldn’t listen.”
She grasped his arm. “So try again.”
O’Grady looked down at her. “You’re right,” he said. “The past. All those wrongs. It’s over. I was angry in the past. I’m even angrier now.” He stepped away, went out of the room, out of the house.
She heard the slam of the Audi door, the engine revving away into the distance.
Chapter 18
O’Grady pushed through the heavy brass doors of the Garda HQ.
May Riley was on reception. Same smart white blouse, same bright red lipstick.
“I guess you’re going to walk straight past me again,” she said.
“I’m just that kind of guy,” he replied, and she laughed.
This time O’Grady didn’t knock. Hawthorne was standing, staring out of the window. He turned. “How the fuck did you get in here?”
“The same way as last time,” O’Grady said.
“Well, you can go out the same fucking way then.”
“Hawthorne, the game’s over. I’ve had enough.”
Hawthorne gave a mirthless laugh. “You know what, O’Grady? No one gives a shit what you think.”
“You know who killed Maura Salter, and it wasn’t that poor sap who did time for it and died in jail. You know that Gregson Elliott had information concerning you and your friend MacAteer, which is why you had to put a stop to him.”
Hawthorne lowered himself into the chair behind his desk. He surveyed O’Grady with his characteristic sneer. “This again? Do you remember what happened last time you went down this road? It was the end of you, O’Grady. Disgraced. I told you if you tried any such thing again I’d have you arrested. I meant it.”
His hand went to a bell by his desk, some kind of push-button.
“I don’t think so.” O’Grady stood in front of him. “I’m ready to start talking about what happened that night Maura died.”
Hawthorne leaned back in his chair, his plump fingers interlinked across his waistcoat. “And who will listen to you? No one believed you then, and no one will believe you now. Who are you, O’Grady? You’re no one. A disgraced police officer.”
O’Grady’s hands tightened into fists at his side.
“As for that American lad,” Hawthorne went on. “I showed great restraint not having you thrown into a cell for the rest of your life.”
“Because you knew the case wouldn’t stand up, Hawthorne.” O’Grady’s voice was ice cold. “I had no motive. Whereas you—you had every reason to get that fella out of the way, because he was the only one who knew what happened the night Maura Salter died. Gregson was about to tell me. Sean O’Connor had let slip that you were out and about that night with Kiley MacAteer.”
Hawthorne gave a rattling laugh. “These are tall tales, O’Grady. Where’s the evidence? You, you were the one found at the scene of the crime, gun in your fingers, a man dead at your feet, in your property.” His arm shot out towards the bell. Before he could reach it, O’Grady had grasped his wrist with both hands and twisted it, hard. Hawthorne’s face grew red with rage and pain.
“I haven’t finished, Brian,” he said. “These killings of the Salter men.” He increased the pressure on Hawthorne’s wrist. Hawthorne’s face tightened, his lips working. “I have been biding my time,” O’Grady said. “It might have looked to you like I was doing nothing at all. But I know exactly what’s happening here.”
Hawthorne was breathing heavily. With his other hand he tried to reach for the bell. “I think it’s time you left, O’Grady,” he said, thick-voiced, as O’Grady’s mobile rang, loud in the stuffy room.
Bridie’s ringtone. He dropped his hold of Hawthorne and snatched up his phone.
“Fire!” she was shouting. “The ghost estate. It’s Jason! Fire! Get there. Please!”
Chapter 19
O’Grady drove fast out of town, back to the estate. He could see the smoke before he smelt it, a thick darkness against the stormy sunset sky.
There was an oily, burning stench in the air as he slammed the car door.
The shell of the golf club house was leaping with flames. There were fire engines, police cars, jets of water crisscrossing the orange smoke.
Bridie was standing, watching the blaze. O’Grady ran to her side and she grasped his arm. “I smelt the smoke,” she said. “I knew. I ran here. There was a huge explosion.” Her voice was flat. “Jason’s in there.…” She nodded her head towards the last building, its empty windows licked with flames. “I’m next.”
His arms were on her shoulders. “No,” he said.
“Water,” she said. “That’ll be me.”
He put his arms around her, but she was rigid, unyielding.
“I won’t let you die,” he said.
The buildings flickered with fire as the sky grew dark. Headlights cut through the smoke. And now two firefighters made their way into the burned-out golf club, fighting through the rubble.
After a long moment, they reappeared, carrying between them a body. O’Grady saw the charred skin, the scalp raw between the remaining patches of blond hair.
Bridie stood motionless, gazing blankly at the scene before them. They laid the body on a stretcher. The firemen stood, one at each side, as if paying their respects. Then they picked up the stretcher and carried Jason to a waiting ambulance.
O’Grady felt Bridie stumble at his side. He caught her, his arms strong around her. He led her away to his car.
Chapter 20
He parked outside the farmhouse. Bridie got out of the car and walked ahead of him.
The house was warm and light. Bobby was sitting by the hearth, pushing a toy fire engine up and down, making vroom-vroom noises. In the kitchen, Vera was washing up their supper dishes.
Bridie went to her son, lifted him into her arms and held him close.
“You smell smoky,” he said to her. He sniffed at her. “I like that smell.”
She buried her face in his soft hair. “I’ll put him to bed,” she said and carried him upstairs.
Vera appeared from the kitchen carrying a bottle of claret and two glasses.
“You’ll be needing a drink,” she said. She poured a glass for O’Grady and one for herself. “I’d say sláinte,” she said, raising her glass, “only it’s not that sort of night.”
“Sláinte agad-sa,” he replied.
She sat down opposite him. “Thank you for putting up with my chatter earlier,” she said. “Sometimes I find myself weighed down with thinking.” She picked up her glass, watched the light filter through the crystal red. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said. “Bridie has very few friends.”
He waited.
“She doesn’t help herself,” she said. She surveyed him, as if making a decision, then spoke again. “I may be speaking out of turn. But my thinking is, it’s guilt. After Maura’s awful death, the violence of it all. Bridie was only a year or so older than her, but she always felt responsible for her. And the boys didn’t help, retreating into that masculine posturing, just like their grandfather. It left Bri
die and her father to carry all the grief, the shame, even. You know what it’s like, a sexual assault in a town like this, there’s always a darkness about it, as if the poor girl was somehow to blame.”
From upstairs they could hear Bobby’s laughter, and then singing, Bridie’s sweet voice. “Seoithín, seo hó, mo stór é, mo leanbh…”
Vera spoke again. “Mr. O’Grady, I am entirely in agreement with you regarding these recent deaths. Someone is using the story of the Green Man and its history with this family as a cover. And yet it’s a terrible misreading of the story. It’s what I said before. The Green Man is all about redemption, the being who dies so that new life can begin. He’s like the spring, the seeds growing in the earth. Why do you think St. Patrick’s Day falls at the March equinox? It’s the same idea, the celebration of a holy man who redeems us.” She shook her head. “Whoever’s doing this knows nothing.” She fell silent.
He sipped his wine. “Miss Joyce,” he said. “What was James Salter like?”
Her eyes darkened at his name. “A terrible man. A horrible man. He left an awful legacy in this family.”
“You knew him well?”
She gave a nod. “When his wife was ill, I came to nurse her. I was only a teenager—Richard and I were about the same age. Then Mary died and then James. I was glad when he died. Everyone was.”
“How did you get involved in Richard’s research?”
She smiled. “I went away to college, did my stint at teaching. When I came back, there was Richard, married now, doing his wonderful work. And so I helped him. Those were happy times,” she said. “Happy times.” Her smile faded. “Up until the dreadful tragedy of Maura.” She flashed him a glance. “Not a tragedy, of course. Worse than that. A terrible, terrible evil…” Her voice sharpened. “To think there is a man still alive who knows that poor girl’s last moments, her pain and suffering, who caused it, delighted in it, found his pleasure in it…” Her voice cracked. Her hand fluttered to her face. She covered her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she murmured.
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