‘I can tell you that,’ Mrs Hayden piped up. ‘It’s that scumbag Anto Devlin, that’s who.’
‘That right, Mossy?’
Mossy, caught between the gardaí and his mother, obviously decided he’d had enough. ‘I didn’t know he had a knife.’
‘Sounds like you were mixing with the wrong sort. Where does this Anto Devlin live then?’
Mossy glanced at his mother. Whether it was her tear-filled eyes or the realisation he was in bigger trouble than he’d expected when he’d headed out that morning, he told them what they wanted to know.
Mackin radioed his colleagues in the other squad car and gave them the details. ‘Right,’ he said to Mossy. ‘Let’s go.’
It was with a sense of satisfaction rather than celebration that less than three hours after Sam Jarvis was stabbed, the two responsible were sitting in the interview rooms in Foxrock Station waiting for their free legal aid solicitors.
West and Andrews arrived back to find Morrison sitting in the main office talking to Baxter and Edwards.
The inspector got to his feet when he saw them. ‘You’re probably not going to like this, but it’s for the best so don’t argue. I’m having Hayden and Devlin transferred to Blackrock and the detectives there will handle the investigation. Detective Sergeant Enright has agreed to take it over and deal with it personally.’
It wasn’t unexpected. ‘I understand.’ West pulled out a chair and sat. ‘Any news on Sam?’
‘He’s in surgery.’
In surgery. It was almost good news. He hadn’t bled out on the way to the hospital, dying alone in the ambulance. Each of the men had their own thoughts and silence settled over the group.
‘No doubt you’ll be heading over there,’ Morrison said finally and got to his feet. ‘Keep me informed.’
Baxter headed to the coffee percolator, poured four mugs of coffee and handed them around.
‘Thanks,’ West said, taking the mug. ‘Any word on Allen?’
‘He’s okay, they’ve released him,’ Edwards said. ‘Sergeant Blunt has sent a car to pick him up and bring him home.’
Andrews grimaced when he tasted his coffee. He crossed to the sugar and ladled three teaspoons in. ‘We going to the Mater?’
It was a relief for West not to have to think about dealing with the two men they had in custody. Morrison had been right. As usual. ‘Yes, we might as well be worrying about Sam there as here.’ He looked at Edwards and Baxter. ‘You don’t need to come; we’ll ring if we hear anything.’
Both men shook their heads. ‘May as well worry there as at home,’ Baxter said. ‘I’ll give Tanya a ring and let her know I’ll be late.’
‘Under the thumb,’ Edwards said with an attempt at humour that managed to raise a slight smile on all their faces.
West rang Edel and explained the situation. ‘I might be very late.’
‘Poor Sam,’ Edel said. ‘But he’s young, healthy, he’ll pull through, Mike.’
‘Hopefully. I’ll ring you when I’m on the way home.’
Andrews rang his wife and filled her in.
‘Oh no,’ Joyce said with quick sympathy. ‘Are you all okay?’
‘We’re all a bit shocked,’ Andrews admitted. ‘I was going to fill you in on something else tonight but it might be late when I get home.’
‘Something else? Sounds mysterious.’
‘I’ll explain but just in case you were making plans, could you meet me in town tomorrow, around 1pm?’
‘In town? Even more mysterious – but I don’t see why not.’
West, standing in his office door, saw a grin flash across Andrews’ face and wondered for a second what he was up to.
He didn’t have a chance to ask, with Edwards and Baxter bustling over, eager to leave.
There was little chat on the long cross-city journey to the Mater hospital. Parking around the old, hugely extended hospital was notoriously bad. Baxter, who was driving, didn’t bother searching for a space. Instead, he parked in an emergency services parking space and put his Garda Síochána Official Business sign on the dashboard.
Andrews appeared to know where he was going, striding along the hospital corridors with the rest on his heels. He pushed open a door into a narrow, quiet stairway, took the stairs up to the next floor and exited to another corridor. ‘This way,’ Andrews said without stopping.
They rounded the next corner and came to a halt, a flurry of patient trolleys in and out of a doorway ahead indicating Andrews hadn’t led them astray.
‘There’s Allen!’ Edwards pointed to a figure standing on the other side of the operating theatre entrance. The hospital staff had obviously taken pity on him and removed his bloodstained clothes. He was wearing a scrub suit a size too small: the fabric of the top stretched across his chest, and the bottoms stopped at least six inches too short to show off colourfully striped socks.
West put a hand on his arm. ‘You should be at home. Blunt was supposed to organise someone to pick you up.’
‘They came. I sent them away. I guessed you’d all arrive here.’
‘At least sit down before you fall down.’
‘I’m fine, honestly. Dr and Mrs Jarvis were here, they’ve gone to make phone calls. We’ve been told it’ll be another hour at least before we hear anything.’
There was no waiting room, just a few uncomfortable chairs positioned along the corridor where Mrs Jarvis sat when she returned, her eyes fixed on the entrance to the operating theatres.
Dr Jarvis alternated between sitting with her, and speaking to the detectives, and it was he who persuaded a reluctant Allen to take one of the other chairs. ‘You’ll be doing me a favour,’ he said. ‘Tell Maggie some stories of your adventures in the guards.’
It was two hours before a scrub-suited man exited the theatre and after a quick glance either direction, headed their way. ‘Dr Jarvis?’
‘That’s me.’ He waved a hand to include the detectives. ‘We’re all here for Sam. How is he?’
‘Lucky,’ the surgeon said bluntly. ‘One millimetre deeper and we wouldn’t be having this conversation. The knife nicked his aorta and he’d lost a considerable amount of blood by the time we opened him up but,’ he said firmly, ‘he’s going to be okay.’
27
Relief had them smiling, shaking hands with the surgeon, thanking him, patting each other on the shoulders and creating so much noise that eventually a head popped out from the theatre and shushed them loudly.
‘I’d better get back before they throw me out along with you,’ the surgeon said, extricating his hand from Mrs Jarvis’s grip with difficulty. ‘Sam will be in recovery for another ten minutes or so before he’s sent back to his room.’
‘Not to intensive care?’
‘It’s not necessary.’ The surgeon reassured the anxious mother once more before giving a wave and disappearing back into the theatre suite.
Despite the good news, nobody wanted to leave until they’d seen Sam coming out. But when he did, deathly pale, intravenous infusions in both arms, a monitor beep-beeping, their voices faded to a whisper.
There was no delay, the hospital staff negotiated the turn and manoeuvred the trolley into the lift with casual expertise. Then he was gone.
‘We’re staying until we see him wake up,’ Dr Jarvis said.
West took out a business card and handed it to him. ‘If you need me. Or need a lift anywhere, please ring. The station will happily organise something… anything.’
‘Thank you.’ The lift door opened and Dr Jarvis and his wife vanished inside.
‘Right,’ West said. ‘Let’s get out of here.’
‘We won’t all fit in my car, you know.’ Baxter looked from one to the other as if mentally wondering who to make walk.
‘Don’t worry about me.’ Allen looked past them to where a figure approached. ‘I’ve organised my lift home. Here it comes.’
They all turned automatically to see an attractive woman in a white coat closing in on the
m, a look of concern on her face that faded when she saw Allen. ‘You ready to go?’
‘Yes.’ Allen put a hand on her arm and turned her to face the other detectives. ‘You’ve heard me speak about this lot often enough.’ He did quick introductions. ‘And this is Dr Izzy George, my flatmate.’
‘Flatmate, my ass,’ Baxter said a few seconds later as Allen and the doctor vanished around a turn in the corridor. He rubbed his face briskly. ‘Anyone else need coffee?’
‘Sounds good,’ Edwards agreed.
Andrews pointed back the way they’d come. ‘There’s a drinks dispenser near the accident and emergency department. If we follow the stairs to the lower ground floor, it’s along there somewhere.’
Much of the older building of the Mater hospital had, over the years, been converted into offices with the wards moved into the newer high-rise extension. All the lower ground floor was now offices and minor departments. This late, most were shut and the corridors were quiet, the detectives’ footsteps echoing eerily on the tiled floor.
‘It’s a bit spooky down here.’ Edwards glanced around. ‘I bet it’s haunted.’
They turned a corner and found themselves in a long, poorly lit corridor. ‘You sure this is right?’ Baxter said. ‘I’m not sure I wanted coffee this desperately.’
West pointed to a directional map on the wall. ‘Let’s find out.’
They gathered around it, trying to follow the faint directions in the poor light. ‘See,’ Andrews said, pointing, the I told you left unsaid.
A loud squeak drew their attention. They turned in time to hear an even louder clunk as a door swung shut behind a man who hurried down the corridor to disappear through double doors at the far end.
‘I’d recognise that walk anywhere,’ West said. ‘That was Darragh Checkley.’
‘Definitely,’ Baxter agreed. ‘Why’s he creeping around here this time of the night?’
‘Let’s have a look and see.’
They stopped outside the door Checkley had come through. ‘Department of Clinical Anaplastology,’ West read aloud and shook his head. ‘I’ve no idea what that is, does anyone?’
After a collective head shake, they walked on and through the door at the end of the corridor. It opened into a bright open space. Double doors to one side led into the accident and emergency department and further double doors ahead were clearly marked exit.
Rows of chairs were fixed to the floor and behind them stood a line of dispensing machines. A few of the chairs were occupied. A couple of people, obviously drunk, were swaying back and forth and singing raucously. A woman was sitting with her head buried in her hands, the young man beside her patting her on the back looked like he was barely keeping it together. There was no sign of Darragh Checkley.
Armed with coffee and bars of chocolate, the detectives left the hospital and made their way around to where they’d parked the car. They were all tired so the only sounds heard on the journey back were the slurp of hot coffee, the crackle of paper and the loud snap as pieces of chocolate were broken off and eaten.
‘Here we go,’ Baxter said as he pulled into the station car park. They all muttered a ‘Thanks, Seamus’ as they got out and he drove off with a wave.
‘G’night. That was some day,’ Edwards said before crossing the almost empty car park to his car.
West turned to Andrews. ‘Some day indeed! Right, I’m going in to let the night shift know Jarvis is okay. I’ll see you in the morning.’
Inside the station, it was unnaturally quiet. The front desk was unattended but West heard the murmur of voices from the office behind. He went around and tapped lightly on the door. It wasn’t a complete surprise to find Sergeant Blunt there, sitting behind the desk while the night sergeant, Chad Delaney, leaned a shoulder against the wall. Both straightened when he came through, their faces instantly relaxing when they saw West’s expression. ‘He’s okay?’ Blunt said.
‘Yes, he was lucky. The surgeon said another millimetre and he wouldn’t have made it.’
‘Good. And you’ll be glad to know those two toerags, Hayden and Devlin, are neatly locked away in Blackrock. Detective Sergeant Enright is delighted: they’re desperate to get themselves off the hook and giving up everyone they know.’
It would be small fry, West knew, and Devlin might do less time for attacking Jarvis as a result. But he knew Enright well, he’d not let them off lightly.
28
West had sent Edel a text from the hospital to tell her Jarvis was going to be okay. When he got home, she was curled up on the sofa watching a movie. She jumped to her feet and put her arms around him. ‘What a terrible day. You want something to eat? There’s some chicken casserole.’
West shook his head and pulled her closer. ‘No, I’m not hungry. Exhausted though, it has been a hell of a day.’
‘And Sam will definitely be okay?’
West pulled back and kissed her on the forehead. ‘He’ll be fine according to the surgeon.’ He didn’t tell her that another millimetre and they’d be having a different conversation. She didn’t need to know that. ‘I fancy a whiskey though.’
‘Coming up.’ She returned a moment later with one for each of them, sat beside him and reached for the remote to switch off the TV. ‘It was a daft movie.’
‘Guess who we saw when we were leaving the hospital.’
‘Lots of doctors and nurses?’
‘Apart from them. Someone we wouldn’t have expected to see.’
‘Inspector Morrison?’
‘Ha, no, not him either. Darragh Checkley. Coming out of one of the departments on the ground floor.’
‘I wouldn’t have thought any of the departments would be open that late.’
‘I doubt if they are.’ He sipped his whiskey. ‘He came from the department of clinical anaplastology.’
‘Anaplastology? I’ve never heard of it.’ She put her drink down on the coffee table and reached for her iPad. ‘I’ll have a look on the internet, see what it is.’ A few seconds later, she was peering at the screen. ‘Listen… anaplastology,’ she read, ‘is a branch of medicine dealing with prosthetic rehabilitation of an absent, disfigured or malformed part of the face or body.’
‘Like glass eyes and prosthetic ears?’ West was puzzled.
Edel was still reading and scrolling through the information. ‘Yes those, plus noses, chins, cheekbones. There are some photos.’ She held the iPad forward for him to see. ‘Maybe Checkley has a glass eye and that’s why he was there.’
‘That late at night? A bit odd, wouldn’t you say?’
Edel was reading on. ‘They train to be anaplastologists in Stanford University Medical Centre. Americans… maybe they keep odd hours, you know, so they can speak to their colleagues in the US.’
‘Maybe.’ It was a possibility. Anyway, whatever it was, Checkley’s medical history was no business of the gardaí.
Edel was still scrolling through, reading out snippets now and then. West’s eye was drawn to her ring. That damn ring. It looked perfect to him but it annoyed him to know it wasn’t. That they’d been conned. He wondered what Andrews was planning. Remembering his devious expression from earlier, West hoped that whatever the detective had in mind was legal and wouldn’t get both of them into trouble.
The iPad was shut with a snap. ‘Fascinating,’ Edel said. ‘I might have to use it in a story sometime. Maybe get an evil anaplastologist to make a new face for himself to commit crimes with… you know, one he could slide on and off as a disguise.’
‘As long as you don’t give any of our criminals the idea.’ West knocked back the last of the whiskey and got to his feet, pulling Edel up beside him. ‘We already, as Inspector Morrison kindly pointed out, attract the weird and wonderful cases, we could do without any weirder.’
Getting to sleep after such a tough day was always going to be difficult. West tossed and turned for a long time before drifting off only for his dreams to be disturbed by yobs carrying larger-than-life cartoon-like knives
that went through his body as if he were invisible. He woke and stared into the darkness for a while before drifting back to sleep. This time it was criminals wearing silicone masks that chased him down twisted alleyways.
At five, he gave up. He couldn’t find the T-shirt he usually left on the chair so in desperation he grabbed Edel’s robe from the back of the door. The pink colour probably did nothing for his image, it was a bit tight but it was warm and surprisingly comfortable.
Coffee perked him up a little. And a slice of toast smothered with butter and marmalade took away the niggling hunger pangs. He found the previous day’s newspaper and read through it without any interest as he ate. When he was finished, he dusted the crumbs from his fingers and looked at the clock.
Five thirty. It was going to be a long day and there was no point sitting there waiting for it to pass when he had so much to do. First on his agenda, was a visit to the Mater to see how Jarvis was. Only then could he face the rest of the day. At least, this early, he’d beat the rush-hour traffic.
As quietly as he could, he showered and dressed in the spare bedroom. Edel usually slept through his morning ablutions so he wasn’t surprised to find her curled up when he opened their bedroom door fifteen minutes later.
It was a shame to disturb her but he knew she’d hate it more if he went without saying goodbye. He bent and planted a kiss on her lips, smiling as she immediately stirred, her eyelids flickering open. ‘I’m heading off early. Go back to sleep. I’ll call you after I’ve seen Sam.’
She looked at him sleepily. ‘Stay safe.’
‘I promise.’ He kissed her again and left.
The traffic was light, the journey across the city faster than he’d expected. What he hadn’t taken into account, though, was to find the front door of the Mater hospital shut tight. Swearing softly, he made his way around to the accident and emergency entrance and tried to use the door they had exited the night before. But he was out of luck. It, too, was shut tight.
A nurse stared at West’s Garda Síochána identification blankly and told him to return when it was visiting time before hurrying away to deal with a patient who was attempting to pull off ECG leads.
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