‘What?’ I was baffled. ‘Are you sure it’s the same thing?’
‘We can’t be absolutely sure yet. And, since we still don’t know what the original infection was, it’s a bit like being blind and in the dark at the same time.’
‘But the symptoms are similar.’
‘To the later stage of Johnston’s illness, yes.’
‘Later stage?’
‘Yes. The boy is dying, I’m afraid. His symptoms began to show on Saturday evening, but his parents left it until early this morning to take him to hospital. They thought he had just caught a summer flu.’
‘Maybe that’s—’
‘Illaun, he’s in a coma, septicaemia is making his organs collapse one by one, he’s bleeding internally and there are pus-filled lesions beginning to appear on his skin. Not common with the flu.’
I felt properly admonished for indulging in wishful thinking.
Cora dropped her voice. ‘But it’s not just that…’ She glanced away briefly, then looked me straight in the eye. ‘Stephen and three other boys were playing together in the Maudlins graveyard last Friday night.’
It was hot in that corridor, but I suddenly felt a clammy chill crawling across my skin.
Cora continued. ‘When his parents mentioned it, I put two and two together. I contacted the other families, but the three lads are fine. Significantly, they claimed they hadn’t gone inside the barriers, which Stephen did. He must have come into contact with the spillage or touched something that had been contaminated by it – possibly just the earth itself.’
‘Shouldn’t you have brought them in for observation?’
‘We didn’t think it was necessary. Don’t forget it’s Monday now. This thing doesn’t hang about. If they had it, we’d know. And, as I said, they didn’t go inside the contaminated area – which, by the way, has now been securely fenced off by the Health Service. They’ve also taken away soil samples.’
Perhaps I’d been too casual on Friday about the spillage, after all. I hadn’t even checked the signs I’d asked Gayle to put up. But, on the other hand, the Town Engineer and the Health Service had both been alerted by Dominic Usher and it had then become their responsibility. I wasn’t trying to wash my hands of it, but that was the fact.
‘In theory, you’re a high-risk contact yourself,’ Cora continued. ‘But, as with the boys, we’re not going to haul you in. The drill is, if you leave Castleboyne for any reason, you have to tell us. And in the meantime, keep an eye on your temperature – anything above thirty-eight degrees and you come straight here.’
‘By air ambulance?’ I joked, thinking of how I would get past the gates.
‘Hmph. Don’t talk to me about helicopters. I’m fed up with them clattering over us all morning.’
‘Photographers, eh?’
She nodded.
‘How did the media know the boy had been admitted?’ I asked.
‘According to a reporter I was talking to from Ireland Today, a member of the staff here at the hospital heard him talking about Terry Johnston on the radio this morning, and rang him with the news that the cases might be connected.’
‘The reporter was Darren Byrne, I take it?’
‘Byrne, yes. He wanted to know the boy’s name, but as we hadn’t even told the parents at that stage what we suspected, or just how seriously ill he was, I wasn’t about to tell him. He didn’t know the other boys’ identities, either, but I’m sure he’s tracking them down. Meanwhile, the rest of the media are camped on our doorstep, there are public-health doctors about to descend on us and the Health Service are up our arses every minute checking on Stephen’s symptoms, because they’ve got the Minister breathing down their necks. As a result, we can’t do our normal work at the hospital, and it’s all thanks to that reporter shooting his mouth off.’
‘Why are you treating the boy here at St Loman’s? Isn’t Beaumont better equipped to deal with something like this?’
‘Yes, it is, and we were getting ready to send Stephen there. But when his condition suddenly became critical the Health Service decided that, since he was unlikely to survive, it would serve no purpose other than possibly widening the outlet for the disease.’
‘There’s a rumour going around that the town could be placed under quarantine.’
‘If – when – Stephen dies, my guess is the Health Service will seriously consider it.’
‘But if it’s acquired only from direct contact with the contaminated area in the graveyard, then it’s not transmitted from person to person.’
‘If that’s how it was picked up. But we can’t be certain. As you wondered yourself, was he exposed to Mr Johnston? Could it be a communicable disease, spread by person-to-person contact, or even by animals? This is now a case with an epidemiological link, which means Stephen may have been exposed either to the confirmed case – Mr Johnston – or to the same source of infection. And it’s an infection that will shortly achieve a hundred per cent mortality. Even though there have been only two victims, we’ll have no choice but to implement strict public-health measures to contain it. Entire countries get practically sealed off these days when some new disease emerges, and that’s even if its killing rate is low. So when there’s talk of an unknown infection breaking out in the vicinity of a plague graveyard, people in medical officialdom get very jittery. Now, I’ve got to go.’ She turned back towards the nurses’ station.
I was tempted to ask her for the other boys’ names and addresses, but Cora was under enough pressure. ‘I saw some people in the waiting room. Are they family?’
‘They’re his parents.’
‘His parents? God, they’re very young.’
‘And not very responsible people, I’m afraid. Stephen was out playing with his pals until three a.m. on Saturday morning. Not only that, but they went to the pub at lunchtime yesterday and stayed there drinking for most of the day. They left Stephen in the care of his sister, who’s barely a year older than him.’
‘Could I have a word with them?’
‘I’d advise caution there,’ said Cora.
‘Do they know…how ill he is?’
‘Yes. It’s not that – it’s… Well, you’ll see for yourself.’
Chapter Seventeen
‘So you’re the bitch that poisoned our child?’ Stephen’s mother made her point as soon I’d introduced myself and tried to sympathise with her and her husband, Kevin.
‘Well, I…’ I was standing just inside the waiting room, facing them where they sat.
‘Take it easy, Tracy.’ Bolton put his arms around her, but she pushed him away and sat stiffly, staring into space. ‘My wife’s very upset. What kind of fuckin’ business are you running, anyway, that you’d leave poisonous waste around the place like that?’
‘We did put up signs,’ I said weakly, wishing I’d checked. ‘Believe me, I’m sorry for what’s happened to Stephen. And it’s vital that we find out exactly how he became infected, so we can save others.’
Tracy Bolton dropped her catatonic pose and looked at me. ‘Others? I don’t care about any others.’ She clapped her hands to her face and wailed, ‘I want my son!’
God forgive me, but it crossed my mind that she’d been watching too many TV soaps. It would have been easier to talk to the father on his own, but for now all I could do was direct my questions to him rather than her.
‘Where do you live, Mr Bolton?’
‘Abbey Fields.’
‘That’s the far side of town from the Maudlins cemetery. Are you sure Stephen was playing there on Friday night?’
‘Yeah. He said they were pretending to be zombies that had rose up from the graveyard.’
‘And they went inside the cordoned-off area. Did he mention that?’
He looked at me warily. ‘Are you saying Stephen done this to himself? So we won’t get compensation. Is that your game?’
‘No. That’s not what I’m saying. Can you tell me who else he was playing with?’
‘How woul
d I know? His mates, I suppose.’
‘And who are they?’
‘Ken Reilly from two doors down. Jason Long from the games arcade up the town. There’s a black lad they hang around with, too – Aje or something. Lives in the estate across the road from ours.’
‘Hey!’ Tracy Bolton leaped up and stood between me and her husband. ‘It’s none of your fuckin’ business who my son was playing with,’ she shouted into my face. Her breath was a blend of alcohol and cigarette smoke. Then she turned around to her husband. ‘And you – you keep your mouth shut. This one’s definitely up to something.’ She slumped back down on the bench and furiously folded her arms.
‘I’d go if I was you,’ Bolton said to me. ‘You shouldn’t have come in here in the first place.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said, and extended my hand to him, but he ignored it and put his arms around his wife.
The light was starting to fade by the time I had tracked down all of the three boys who’d been playing with Stephen Bolton. Jason Long and Ken Reilly were not at home and not to be found in the street outside Ken’s house; but with the help of numerous informers – mainly girls, for some reason – I found them on the edge of a piece of scraggy woodland bordering Abbey Fields housing estate. Wearing their grey and somewhat bedraggled school uniforms, they were sitting on a felled trunk. A fire had evidently been set in its hollow in the not-too-distant past – there was still a whiff of wood-smoke in the air.
As if training for their adolescence, they answered my questions in sullen monosyllables, interspersed with occasional giggles and knowing looks at each other. I took a different tack. I told them I was a skeleton hunter.
‘What do you hunt them with?’ asked Ken, taking the bait.
‘I look for them in the ground. Found lots of them in the cemetery where you were playing on Friday night… I left one or two behind, though. In those coffins. But they’ve gone missing.’
‘We didn’t go near them, honest,’ said Jason. ‘There were signs on the barriers.’
‘Did you climb the barriers? Did you go inside?’
They looked from one to the other. ‘Yes,’ they said in unison.
‘You should have let the people in the hospital know you’d been in there.’
‘No way. We’d have been given an injection,’ said Ken.
‘And what about Aje? Did he go in there too?’
‘He wasn’t supposed to, ’cause he was chasing us,’ said Jason.
‘With the zombie knife,’ Ken added.
‘The zombie knife?’
Ken put his hand up to his mouth as if he had said too much. But they were reverting to nine-year-olds who were more interested in scaring me than in behaving all macho.
‘Yeah,’ said Jason. ‘He’s got this big African knife. If it kills you, you turn into a zombie.’
‘But if you’re inside the barrier he can’t get you.’ A bug-eyed Ken was reliving the game.
Children cannot bear too much terror. Like all of their kind, the boys had established a sanctuary. Ironically, it was in the area where the real terror was lurking.
‘And did his parents know he had the knife with him?’
Ken and Jason giggled, but then it died away and they looked a bit sheepish.
‘It wasn’t a real knife,’ said Jason glumly.
‘He’d left the real one at home,’ Ken explained. ‘We’ve seen it. It’s huge.’
On the way to my final destination I phoned Finian.
‘I’m really sorry, my love, but I’m going to have to cancel our plans for this evening. I haven’t had time to choose a restaurant, let alone book a table.’
‘Oh, well. What happened at the hospital?’
‘There’s a young boy there dying of the same infection that killed Terry Johnston. He and his pals were playing in the Maudlins cemetery on Friday night. I’m tracking down the other boys. I want to get to the bottom of this.’
‘It’s not up to you,’ he said curtly.
‘I’ve already found out some useful information. I’m not stopping now.’
Silence. Finian’s sign of disapproval. ‘I’m worried about your safety,’ he said eventually.
‘Oh, come on, Finian. You sound just like my mother.’ I winced as soon as I’d said it. ‘Sorry, that was unfair. But I’m just talking to some kids. I promise you I won’t poke my nose where it might get bitten off.’
‘You better keep that promise – or you’ll have me and your mother to contend with. In the meantime, I’ll poke my nose into SIV. See what I can come up with on Our Lady of Castleboyne.’
We had already said goodbye when I realised I’d forgotten to ask him if he’d heard from the National Trust. But I presumed he would have mentioned it if he had.
Aje answered the door himself. I noticed that his uniform was neat and tidy and, seeing a pen in his hand, I guessed I had interrupted his homework. At first I thought he was alone, but then a woman came down the stairs and introduced herself as his mother, Mrs Ngozi. I explained why I had come, and she agreed to let him talk to me, but she was nervous about it; she stood at the door while he and I had an awkward conversation. Aje’s English was fine, but he was being reticent, while his mother seemed anxious to end our encounter as quickly as possible.
‘Aje, were you the only boy who didn’t go inside the cordoned-off area?’
He nodded his head solemnly in agreement. I had made him sound like the responsible one.
‘Because you were the one with the zombie knife?’
Aje’s eyes changed from innocent to scared.
I heard a man coughing in an upstairs room.
‘What knife?’ his mother said in alarm.
Aje’s eyes pleaded with me to explain.
‘It’s OK, Mrs Ngozi. It’s an imaginary knife.’
‘I do not understand what is going on. Leave us alone now.’ She began to close the door.
Aje tapped my arm. ‘I did go inside. I really scared them,’ he whispered proudly, smiling and winking at me.
I winked back. Aje and his pals had all been inside the contaminated area. So why had Stephen Bolton been the only one to pick up the infection?
Chapter Eighteen
When I arrived back at my house, it felt like I’d been gone for a week. My mother was away for the day, visiting her sister Betty, who lived about ten kilometres from Castleboyne. On fine summer’s evenings they liked to sit out and drink a G&T on Aunt Betty’s patio. More than one, and my mother would stay the night. I had a hunch this would be a more-than-one night, because she’d taken Horatio with her.
I tore off my limp jacket and threw it in a heap on the couch. I was opening up windows and doors to release the warm air that had built up during the day when my mobile chirped.
It was Peter Groot. ‘Matt Gallagher gave me your number, and he sends his regards. Any place around here you’d recommend for dinner?’
‘Your hotel’s not bad.’ It’s not good either, Illaun.
‘I meant a place with a bit of atmosphere or good food. Preferably both.’
‘You’re right. There’s a place on the river, a couple of kilometres outside the town, called the Mayfly. They have freshwater fish on the menu. Nice on an evening like this. And no need to book.’ I started to peel off a cami-top that the heat seemed to have fused to my skin.
‘And even nicer in the right company, I’m sure. Would you care to join me?’
I was surprised, but not entirely surprised. I dangled the cami on my fingertip. It swung like a metronome. Will you, won’t you? it ticked, back and forth. You just cancelled your date with your fiancé. But I had told him that I was trying to find out what had caused this outbreak – and Groot would have the results of Johnston’s post-mortem. Oh, to hell with it, I thought: I’m curious about this guy, full stop. As well as which, I was starving, too tired to cook and too bored with takeaways to order one.
I swirled the garment full circle and fired it into another corner of the couch. ‘You’re on.
’
‘I’ll order a taxi and collect you at…eight-thirty?’
I resisted the urge to say I’d drive and collect him. It would be nice for a change to relax and have a few drinks and not be the designated driver, which I almost always was when Finian and I went out together. ‘Great. See you then. The taxi driver will know where I live.’
After a shower I decided that, the evening still being oppressively warm, I should wear something light. But what? Anyone looking into my wardrobe would probably conclude that I either shared it with several others or shared my personality with several others. ‘Eclectic’ was the euphemism I preferred, and it was brought about by many factors, including a tendency to respond like a chameleon to whatever circumstances I found myself in – sometimes accidentally (bumping into an undertaker in the street when I was dressed in black), sometimes deliberately (planning a trip to the sea on a bright sunny day and having to resist the urge to wear light blue). So I had to be ready with a wide range of possibilities in my wardrobe.
Blue must have been on my mind, because I eventually picked a floral-pattern chiffon dress in aquamarine and blue and decided to wear cork-heeled wedge sandals with it. I put my hair up at the sides with silver combs and put on lapis drop-earrings and a matching bead necklace. I had no handbag to match, so I sneaked into my mother’s place and borrowed a dark-blue leather clutch bag.
Checking myself in the mirror, I wondered what was compelling me to act this way. Was it the contrast between Finian’s caution and Groot’s devil-may-care attitude? Groot had certainly stirred up something in me. I would have to make sure it didn’t get out of control.
When the taxi dropped us at the restaurant I noticed the car park was practically full, so when we were offered a cancelled table straight away we accepted it. It meant we didn’t have a chance to sit and talk at the bar, but I wasn’t complaining. The hot night was having no effect on my appetite. As Groot stood while I was being seated, I finally got a proper chance to see what he was wearing: a lightweight, avocado-green jacket with a pale-yellow shirt – a combination that emphasised his tanned features – a pair of cream chinos and slip-on shoes of the softest yellow leather. They were probably made from the skin of a baby gazelle, but I didn’t want to ask.
The Lazarus Bell, an Irish Murder Mystery Page 13