The Ruin

by Dervla McTiernan

  Maude assented, quietly, and Hackett nodded. ‘Present in the interview room are DS Melanie Hackett, and Garda Daniel McIntyre.’

  ‘Can I get you coffee or tea? Glass of water?’ Hackett asked.

  Maude shook her head, thought of all the cop shows she’d seen where police got DNA from a coffee cup. But DNA was hardly an issue here, surely? And anyway, she’d been arrested, couldn’t they compel her to give a sample? She had no idea. Something to ask a lawyer, if she had one. She would ask for a lawyer, she should call Tom, but not yet. Not until she knew more.

  ‘I’d like to ask you some questions about your mother’s death,’ Hackett said.

  ‘My mother,’ Maude said.

  Hackett waited.

  ‘My mother died twenty years ago. She was an alcoholic. She died from a drug overdose, though she was dying in any case and I expect that the drugs only brought her death forward by a few months, if that. I have no idea why anyone would think that I killed her.’

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to tell me in your own words how your mother died.’

  ‘I’m sure you have the coroner’s report.’

  Hackett inclined her head. ‘I do. But I’d like to hear about it from you.’

  Maude hesitated. ‘I wasn’t in the room when she died,’ she said at last.

  ‘Tell me what you do remember.’

  ‘It was twenty years ago. I was very young.’

  ‘You were fifteen.’ This from McIntyre.

  ‘I remember quite a bit from when I was fifteen,’ Hackett said. ‘Mostly things I’d rather forget.’

  ‘I don’t remember anything because, as far as I recall, that night was the same as every other night. Nothing strange happened. Nothing out of the ordinary. I didn’t even realise my mother had died until the following morning.’

  Hackett shifted her weight in her chair, turned a page in the file she had in front of her. ‘Describe an ordinary night in your home for us, so,’ she said. She spoke so casually, just a chilled-out conversation between friends.

  Maude shrugged. ‘I had a job, milking at a dairy farm down the road, some cleaning in their kitchen. I’d work until two, then I’d walk into the village and pick Jack up, walk him home. I’d make him dinner, make dinner for my mother. We’d play or read for a while, then I’d get him ready for bed.’

  ‘What about your mother?’ asked McIntyre. ‘She didn’t look after you or your little brother?’

  Maude shook her head. ‘My mother wasn’t well. She would have cared for us if she’d been able.’ Maude caught a flash of amusement in McIntyre’s eyes as she spoke.

  ‘Did you bring dinner to your mother on the evening she died?’ Hackett asked.

  ‘I suppose I must have. I don’t remember specifically, but I did that every night so I suppose I must have done.’

  ‘It sounds like you had a lot of responsibility for someone so young. You didn’t resent it? That your mother left so much for you to do?’ McIntyre asked.

  Maude shook her head, said nothing. He was making her uncomfortable. There was something behind his eyes, something in the way he looked at her. Her mouth was dry, and she swallowed. Realised she had shifted her weight backwards in her chair, an unsuccessful effort to put distance between them.

  ‘Did you talk to your mother that night?’ Hackett asked.

  ‘I don’t remember. I’m sorry.’

  ‘What would you have done on a standard night? Did you sit with her while she ate? Did you talk?’

  Maude shrugged again. ‘I . . . mostly just gave her dinner, then went down to Jack.’

  ‘No conversation?’

  ‘My mother was very sick. She slept all the time. When she was awake she was confused. I . . . we didn’t chat,’ Maude said.

  ‘Shouldn’t she have been in hospital? Getting medical care?’ Hackett’s voice was gentle, oh so sincere.

  ‘I’d tried. More than once. She wouldn’t go, and the couple of times I got her there, she wouldn’t stay.’ Maude closed her eyes for a moment, opened them again. ‘Looking back as an adult I can see things more clearly. My mother made it very clear though that she didn’t want medical treatment. The last time she was in hospital she signed a DNR, then called a cab to bring her home.’ With no money to pay for it, all the way from Castlebar. The cabbie had lost his shit, screaming and roaring at Maude, Hilaria having already disappeared inside the house. Until Jack came out, and took Maude’s hand protectively. The cabbie had looked at Jack, with his badly cut hair, his little boy chest out but his lower lip wobbling, then looked at Maude, then at the house behind them, with its boarded-up windows and leaking gutters. He’d uttered one last fuck and left.

  ‘I think my mother had had enough. She was in a lot of pain. The doctors had told her she didn’t have much time left. I think she was ready to die.’

  ‘Are you suggesting she committed suicide?’ McIntyre asked.

  ‘No. Just that . . . it might have been a release,’ said Maude.

  McIntyre spoke up. ‘Have you been telling yourself that, for all these years?’

  Maude didn’t miss the flash of amusement in his eyes. She could see, though she thought that Hackett did not, that McIntyre was entertained by the situation. He took pleasure in her interrogation, in the prompting of her painful memories, in an idle sort of way. With that recognition, she realised why she was afraid of him. She had known someone like him once, when she was young.

  ‘Tell me about finding her body,’ Hackett said, before Maude had a chance to respond.

  ‘It was the next morning,’ Maude said. ‘I went into her room to see her, before I brought Jack to school. It was still dark, but I had a candle. She was lying on the bed, but she didn’t move when I called her. When I got close enough, I realised why.’ Maude could almost feel the cold clamminess of her mother’s forehead, as it had felt that morning when she’d finally been brave enough to reach out and touch her.

  ‘How did you know?’ Hackett asked. ‘You said it was obvious. How did you know she was dead?’

  ‘I touched her, and her skin was cold. There was blood at the corners of her mouth. Her eyes were open, but they . . . weren’t right. And she had a shoelace tied around her arm. There was a needle still in her arm. I pulled it out.’

  ‘What did you do next?’

  ‘I left the room. I found my brother and I brought him to school. Then I went to the post office and used the payphone to call the police.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘I waited.’

  ‘You didn’t tell anyone else? Didn’t call a family friend, or a relative?’ Hackett asked.

  Maude looked at him blankly. They’d had no relatives, no family friends. Wasn’t that obvious?

  ‘You just went back to the house, and waited there by yourself?’

  Maude nodded.

  ‘Your mother was dead upstairs; you weren’t afraid?’

  Maude laughed despite herself. ‘It’s not the dead you need to be afraid of.’

  ‘What were you afraid of, Maude?’ Hackett was smooth. She got the tone just right, a perfect mix of sympathy and solidarity.

  Maude shook her head, said nothing. Reminded herself to be careful. Hackett wasn’t stupid. And McIntyre. He was something else.

  Hackett turned some pages in her file, appeared to check something. ‘When Garda Reilly came to the house that night, you were alone with your little brother. You went back to the school to collect him?’

  Maude nodded again.

  ‘And you told no one at his school, not a teacher, not one of the mothers, that your own mother was dead at home.’ This from McIntyre. A statement rather than a question.

  ‘No.’

  ‘You weren’t upset. I suppose no one could blame you.’

  ‘I think I was in shock.’

  He waited, but she said nothing more.

  ‘Your brother was hurt. He had bruises,’ Hackett said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘On examination at hospital he was found to ha
ve a fracture to his right arm. And a number of other injuries. Fractured ribs, partially healed. A healed fracture to his left arm. Some burn scars.’

  Maude said nothing but memories came flooding back. Memories of pain, of desperate worry. Memories of a small and trusting hand in hers.

  ‘Did your mother hurt him, Maude?’ Hackett asked quietly.

  Maude shook her head, said nothing.

  ‘She hurt Jack, and she hurt you, didn’t she? That’s why you had to kill her, to make the beatings stop.’

  Maude met Hackett’s gaze straight on. ‘My mother never hit me in her life. Never hit Jack. That’s not the way she was made. She was an alcoholic. She made a lot of mistakes. But she never once raised a hand to us.’

  Hackett put her hand on a manila file sitting on the table in front of her. ‘A colleague recently interviewed a social worker who was involved in your case. She was very clear that you and your brother were afraid of your mother. It was her view that you were both physically abused by your mother. You’re telling me that she got it wrong?’

  Maude shook her head. ‘Our mother never hurt us.’

  ‘So your brother’s injuries were all accidents. He just tripped and fell on the cigarettes, did he? More than once?’ There was sudden dislike in Hackett’s voice, as if Maude’s defense of her mother had offended the detective.

  Hackett opened her mouth to speak again but was interrupted by McIntyre. ‘Detective Sergeant Cormac Reilly, you know him?’

  Hackett stirred uneasily at the question, looked at the tape recorder.

  ‘I’m sorry?’ Maude asked.

  ‘Cormac Reilly, the garda who came to your house the night your mother died. You met with him earlier this week. He visited you in your hotel room.’

  What? McIntyre’s expression was bland again. His face gave nothing away.

  ‘I . . . no. I haven’t seen Garda Reilly in twenty years.’ And somehow that simple truth sounded more like a lie than anything else. Maude glanced towards Hackett, who gave McIntyre a look of her own.

  ‘Let’s get back on track,’ Hackett said. ‘Were you taken into care?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Your brother’s injuries were very severe. If he had been beaten that badly in the past it seems strange that he was not put into care.’

  Maude said nothing, waited for the question. She wanted to bring the interview to an end, but she still didn’t know why she’d been brought here.

  Hackett paused, turned a page in the file. She seemed to have lost her sense of direction. ‘Blake. Not a particularly Irish name.’

  ‘My mother’s family were Anglo-Irish.’

  ‘Wealthy?’ McIntyre asked.

  ‘At one time, certainly.’

  ‘What happened?’ Hackett asked.

  ‘An old story. I come from a long line of alcoholics and wastrels. By the time my mother was born the money was gone, except for a small trust fund.’

  ‘Your mother didn’t work?’

  ‘She taught English. She was a writer. But I was born in 1978. My mother wasn’t married, so after that she couldn’t get teaching jobs. By the time Jack was born the money had run out. Not long after that we moved to Galway. The house was an old family house. I don’t even know if my mother owned it. Probably the land and house had long since been sold, but as the house was abandoned, my mother just reclaimed it.’

  ‘No other family?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And you’ve said your mother was an alcoholic?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And a drug addict?’

  Maude shrugged.

  Danny broke in, his voice unnecessarily loud. ‘The coroner’s report showed no evidence of previous drug use.’

  ‘I never knew her to use drugs.’ Maude turned her gaze from Hackett to Danny. ‘I didn’t say she was a drug addict.’

  ‘You didn’t say she wasn’t,’ McIntyre said, then glanced at Hackett.

  ‘She didn’t use drugs?’ Hackett asked.

  ‘Other than alcohol, not that I was aware of.’

  ‘Other than the day she died.’ McIntyre’s tone was an accusation.

  Maude said nothing. She stared into Hackett’s eyes. They were a cool, calm blue. There was no ally to be found there.

  ‘Where do you think she got the heroin?’ Hackett asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘She had friends? People who visited the house?’

  Maude shifted slightly in her chair. She checked her watch. ‘Yes. Of sorts.’

  ‘Of sorts?’ said Hackett. ‘Where did they meet?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Can you recall their names?’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’ Maude took a breath. ‘Look, I’ve answered all your questions, though this whole thing is bloody ridiculous. And I have a question I’d like to ask now.’

  Hackett raised an eyebrow, waited.

  ‘My brother Jack. Your investigation into his death. I’ve been asking questions since I got to Galway, and no one is answering them. I’ve given you proof that Jack didn’t kill himself as you say he did, and you’ve done nothing. I’ve made a formal complaint; requested that the investigation be reopened. A week later and it seems that you have done nothing at all to find my brother’s murderer, but you are instead focusing on the death of my mother. A death that took place twenty years ago, and that for no reason at all that I can see, you have chosen to lay at my door.’

  ‘At the risk of sounding clichéd, Maude, I have to remind you that we are the ones who ask the questions. Although you haven’t asked a question yet.’

  ‘What I want to know is what all of this has to do with my brother’s death. I want to know if you are ever going to investigate his murder, and if not, why not.’

  Mel Hackett shook her head slowly. ‘We’re not here to talk about your brother’s death,’ she said.

  ‘Although perhaps we should be,’ McIntyre said.

  His gaze was almost feverish now. The implication of his statement was obvious. There it was.

  ‘I’d like to see my solicitor now,’ Maude said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  It was half eight before Cormac reached the station. The carpark was almost empty, but he recognised Hackett’s little red hatchback. He asked himself what he would do if she and Danny were still interviewing Maude Blake. Interrupt? Take the interview over? Just observe, and let them fuck it up? Cormac forced himself to walk up the stairs, instead of taking them three at a time and at speed, which is what he really wanted to do. He wanted to burst into the squad room, to rant and rage at whoever was present. Instead he compressed his rage into a white-hot ball and told himself he would use it as fuel.

  The squad room was quiet. No sign of Danny, but Melanie Hackett was working at her desk. He replayed everything he knew about her. She was short, no more than five foot five. Spikey blonde hair intended to convey . . . something. He’d heard she was ambitious. That was it. Fuck.

  He stood over her. ‘What is it that you think you’re doing?’ Cormac asked, very calmly.

  She looked up, took off her glasses, pushed her chair away, putting a little distance between them. ‘I’m doing my job, detective, how about you?’

  ‘I’m certainly doing my job, Detective Hackett. In fact, I was interviewing a witness this afternoon, at the same time, as I understand it, that you were arresting my suspect. Where is she?’ he asked.

  ‘In the cells.’ There was a little pink in her cheeks now, but she was otherwise admirably cool.

  ‘So you’ve charged her.’ It wasn’t a question, but Hackett nodded.

  ‘On what evidence?’

  For a moment, it seemed as if she wasn’t going to answer him.

  ‘On the strength of Hannah Collins’s statement,’ she said.

  Cormac gave a grim smile. ‘So you got nothing out of the interview. Because you went in completely unprepared. A twenty-year-old case, no forensics, no motive, and of the three people who were in the house that night, t
wo are dead. But you think you’re going to get the DPP to bring this to court based on the word of a junkie who wants to get out of prison. A junkie with a history of providing inaccurate information to the gardaí.’

  She stared back at him, poker face intact.

  ‘I don’t arrest suspects where there is no evidence, Mel. Do you know why? Because if I arrest someone, they are going to jail. That’s the way it works. I take them in when I’ve got them. This is not a drugs case. This is murder. And you have just fucked up royally.’

  Melanie glanced around the room. There was only one garda within hearing distance, a uniform who was keeping his attention on his computer screen. She turned away from him, back to her own computer, and put a hand on her mouse, signalling an end to their conversation.

  Not happening. Cormac grabbed the closest empty chair and pulled it towards him, then sat facing her, a little too close for comfort. He leaned in.

  ‘I want to know if this is how you do business here, because it sure as hell isn’t how we work in Dublin. This is my case. I was interviewing a witness when you arrested my suspect without my consent, without even as much as a phone call. Where I come from that would be a firing offence. Except it would never fucking happen, because no self-respecting detective would ever do it. So my question is this – are you incompetent? Do you want to get fired? Or is something else going on here?’

  She turned her face to him. ‘Listen, Murphy ordered it, all right? You were not getting the job done, for reasons I’m not going to speculate about.’ She looked him up and down. ‘You have a problem, take it up with Murphy.’

  She turned again to her computer.

  Jesus Christ. Had Murphy decided to pull the case? It was less than a day since their last meeting. ‘Maybe I’ll do that,’ Cormac said. He pushed his chair back.

  ‘You won’t get him now,’ Hackett said to her computer screen. ‘He left for Dublin this afternoon. Won’t be back until Tuesday.’

  Fuck.

  ‘Melanie.’ He put conciliation in his voice, waited until she turned to face him again. ‘What changed? I left Murphy’s office yesterday just before lunch and I was the lead on this case. Twenty-four hours later he leaves for Dublin, but not before he puts the case in your hands, no phone call, no notice to me. What am I missing?’