‘Thanks for seeing me, Sarah… I know how hard this must be…’ But her sister jumped in before Oonagh could finish. ‘Listen, love, can we cut the crap? We both know you’re here to dig the dirt. It’s what your mob do, isn’t it?’
Perhaps the rumours about Harry’s extracurricular activities had reached home. Or perhaps his wife had known already.
‘Gill…’ Sarah looked like a woman too close to the edge to be left on her own ‘… can you just give us a few minutes, eh?’ Her sister barged out of the room only unfolding her arms long enough to slam the door behind her. ‘She’s just a bit… protective.’
‘That’s ehm… understandable,’ said Oonagh, thinking how well Gill would do if she ever went into the protection racket. ‘Sarah, thanks for agreeing to speak to me.’ She’d expected a slight response, but nothing. ‘As I said on the phone, Harry’s death must have been awful for you. I want to do a special feature on the devastation a violent death can cause to the families left behind.’ Sarah Nugent was leaning back against the worktop, arms folded, cup of coffee in one hand. She raised an eyebrow, telling Oonagh she’d need a bit more to go on.
‘Have the police offered you any counselling, or…’
‘They offered me a twelve year old family liaison officer, does that count?’
Oonagh twisted around in her chair, but they were alone.
‘I said thanks but no thanks. I don’t need some copper hanging around here. Interfering. Making me feel worse.’ Her eyes welled up and she tipped her head back, blinking hard to stem the tears.
‘Sarah, I know it can seem like that, but believe me, these officers are well trained, you might find it helpful.’ Oonagh wouldn’t have got within spitting distance of an interview if a liaison officer was hanging around, but she knew how vital they could be. ‘I’ve worked closely in the past with families of murder victims, the trauma can be…’
‘I can take care of myself.’
Sarah Nugent had the look of someone who knew how to handle herself on a good day. Today wasn’t that good. She sipped her coffee, clutching the mug with both hands to stop her hands from shaking. Oonagh didn’t want to push her too hard; finding your husband swinging from the banister of the marital home was no easy gig. Her eyes had a haunted look, red from crying, the skin underneath tender and creased.
‘Clearly someone had a grudge against your husband, Mrs Nugent…’
‘Of course someone had a fucking grudge against my husband.’ She slammed her mug on the worktop, ‘And a serious one at that. D’you think someone took him out because he’d parked in the disabled space at Waitrose?’
Her sudden change of demeanour caught Oonagh on a back foot. The fact she’d said took him out and not killed or murdered suggested that Mrs Nugent was no stranger to the polite society often frequented by local thugs. She may well have had her reasons for not wanting the cops hanging around.
‘Sarah, what did your sister mean about digging the dirt on Harry?’ She needed to start getting some answers here. She’d agreed to an interview, so she must have wanted to give her some information. It was time to toughen up. ‘Was Harry…?’ She was trying to think of a polite way of asking if her dead husband had been up to his neck in something. ‘The cops have got a funny way of turning over the tiniest of stones, and there’s no telling what lies beneath them.’ Sarah didn’t answer her, but at least Oonagh hadn’t been told to piss off this time, so she was making some ground. ‘If you can come across as the grieving widow…’ Shit, that came out wrong. Oonagh raised her hand by way of an apology; Sarah’s face was like thunder. ‘If something suspect is revealed about Harry, then now might be a good time to… to disassociate yourself from whatever or whoever he was involved with.’ Oonagh knew only too well how guilt by association worked. That wasn’t to say she thought this woman was lily white, but she had nothing to gain at this stage from antagonising her any further. Sarah pulled out a chair and sat opposite her. Apparently ready to talk.
‘So what kind of husband was he?’ Oonagh actually hated that question – never having had a husband, she wasn’t quite sure where the benchmarks were. But it was an opening for Sarah Nugent to say whatever the hell she liked about the man as long as she did a decent PR job on herself.
‘The usual type.’ She scratched at an imaginary mark on the island unit that served as a table between them. ‘Harry was more than happy to give me my…’ she paused ‘… space. We had different interests, you see.’
There was something in the way she said it that gave Oonagh the distinct impression she was already trying to distance herself from her dead husband. If that was the case then she was doing a good job. Setting this up as a typical couple married for two decades but who had grown apart. No longer love’s young dream, but they weren’t exactly throwing plates at each other either.
‘How well did you know Harry’s friends? His business associates?’
She shrugged, biting her bottom lip
‘Would you agree to go on camera, Sarah?’ Oonagh was about to reassure her it would just be a short interview when she saw the flash in her eyes that suggested she would very much like to appear on television. It was the chink she was looking for and Oonagh knew she’d need to work fast on this one. ‘It’ll obviously be upsetting, but it could help. If people see the human side of this tragedy, what Harry has left behind, then…’
But Sarah Nugent was already one step ahead. ‘If you think it could help another woman in the same circumstances…’ she looked into her coffee cup, and nodded ‘… I don’t know what Harry was supposed to have done, but he didn’t deserve to die this way.’
Bloody hell, this woman was good. She decided to break her in slowly. ‘Can we just go over some background here, Sarah?’ She didn’t say no, which Oonagh took as a yes. ‘How did you two meet?’
‘I was working,’ she said, looking off into the middle distance to nowhere in particular. ‘I’d been a model…’ she must have caught a look in Oonagh’s eye ‘… obviously not big league. I was never going to make it, I knew that, so I continued my nursing training.’ Oonagh had no idea where this was going. ‘It’s such a rewarding profession…’ she paused for effect ‘… helping others.’ Oonagh wasn’t sure if she should let her continue or tell her to keep her power dry until she came back with the cameras. She wasn’t sure if Mrs Nugent would remember her lines the second time round.
‘I first saw Harry at Breakmire.’ She caught Oonagh’s expression. ‘You know, the hospital just past Maryhill?’
‘Oh, right, yeah.’ The building had lain derelict for years, but from what Oonagh could remember it had been an asylum back in the days when mental health treatment was even grimmer than it was now.
‘He’d been doing some charity work there and I was on the wards. He asked me out the second time he saw me. Three weeks later we were engaged, and sixteen weeks after that we were married. I’d already given up nursing by then. Harry said there was no need for me to work.’
‘All sounds very romantic,’ said Oonagh, who could think of nothing worse and thought the whole thing sounded decidedly sinister.
Sarah Nugent stood up and staggered slightly as she opened the fridge; Oonagh detected the telltale signs of the early morning social drinker. The house was all cream leather and high-end gloss furniture that clearly cost a fortune, but there wasn’t an ounce of character in this home. Her sister was obviously doing well. Oonagh wondered if Harry’s generosity extended to Sarah’s family, but decided against probing too deeply into that one for now.
‘Have the police said when you’ll be allowed home?’ Oonagh guessed it wasn’t just the fact that the house was now a crime scene that kept Sarah away.
‘Any time really,’ she said, tipping the dregs of her coffee into the sink, deciding instead to pour herself a very large glass of wine. ‘They were here this morning,’ she held the bottle until the glass was precariously full. Oonagh eyed the label and wondered if she was aware it cost over seventy quid a pop.
‘They’ve got what they need.’
Oonagh felt a slight stirring of guilt, but knew the interview would be better if it was filmed in her own home. ‘If you’d rather we didn’t film there, then that’s understandable, we could just…’
Again Sarah Nugent just shrugged, which Oonagh decided was a yes.
If this woman was aware of the rumours surrounding her husband, she was making a good job of hiding it. Despite her designer clothes and flash house, Harry Nugent’s widow didn’t look like a complete stranger to Glasgow’s underworld. Or perhaps it was because of the expensive trappings that she set out to be a tough cookie. Whatever the reason, Oonagh was wary of asking too much at this stage. It wasn’t yet lunchtime and Sarah had already made short work of a bottle of wine. It was unlikely she’d get much more sense out of her today. But more than that, Oonagh got the distinct impression that Sarah Nugent wasn’t a woman she should cross.
8
The hotel nestled on the banks of Loch Lomond, less than twenty miles outside Glasgow. Oonagh was glad of the excuse to leave the city today. Normally she loved the drive out to this part of the country, the clear air, the loch, Ben Lomond rising from the shoreline, but today was different. She parked up and made her way through to the residents’ lounge, waiting just a few moments before being shown to a table by the window.
Oonagh stood when he came into the lounge. He’d long since retired, but still drew a few glances, even somewhere like this. He’d been a hero in his day. The roll of his shoulder gave away the slight limp on his left leg and he placed his hands on the back of each chair he passed, apparently too proud to use a stick. Oonagh clasped his outstretched hand as he neared her table, the perfect excuse to help him ease down onto the soft leather chair.
Jack Nesbit had been a legend in Scottish football, both on and off the pitch. He was old school, from a time when managers commanded respect and his players all called him Mr Nesbit. Never Jack. Always Mr Nesbit. She’d thought it would take weeks to set up this interview, so hadn’t thought twice about cancelling her scheduled meeting with Alan, and had jumped at the chance to come here instead when Mr Nesbit had agreed to meet her this afternoon. She wasn’t sure how much she’d get out of him, but so far he was the only one willing to talk to her about Harry Nugent.
‘Mr Nesbit.’
‘Call me Jack.’ He smiled, looked pleased that she’d given him his place. It was rumoured that he was losing it. Too many years heading a ball heavy enough to shatter a human skull left its mark.
‘D’you still play?’ Oonagh knew the answer to that question, but asked out of politeness. No one wanted to be thought of as past it.
‘Oh, yes.’ He nodded, then leaned forward to make sure she heard. ‘They had to put weights on my Zimmer to give the younger boys a chance to keep up.’ Despite his years, Jack Nesbit had lost none of his old charm.
The waiter took their order: Macallan Gold for him, pot of tea for Oonagh. Scotland’s new drink drive laws were a nightmare; it was getting so that she was scared to swallow a drop of mouthwash some mornings in case it tipped her over the limit, and she’d already downed so much coffee she was sure her nerves could be heard jangling from the other side of Ben Lomond.
‘Bet you’ve seen some changes in the game in your day.’
There was just a hint of a smile. ‘More than you’ll ever know, hen.’ He took a sip of his Scotch. ‘Silly money now. Wasn’t like that back in the day. And back in the day the manager was the boss.’ He jerked his thumb towards his chest, then grabbed the arm of his chair for support as he leaned forward to place his glass back on the table. ‘Not like now, when the players are treated like superstars and the dressing room smells like a tart’s boudoir.’
Oonagh stifled a grin. Jack Nesbit really was from a different era right enough. They both knew why she was there, but she still took her time, leading in gently with the question. ‘Harry Nugent?’ She paused but got little response. ‘His death must have been a huge shock to you?’
He shrugged, looking at the bottom of his glass. ‘When you get to my age, hen, not much shocks you.’
The window gave a spectacular view over the loch. It wasn’t yet three o’clock but the low winter sun was already threatening to dip into the water.
‘Stunning, isn’t it?’ He meant it more as a rhetorical question but Oonagh nodded, Loch Lomond had always been one of her favourite parts of the world. ‘I’ve been luckier than most,’ he added. ‘This…’ He stretched his hand across the view. ‘Never thought I could have all this.’
Jack Nesbit had grown up in a mining town in Lanark; this was a world away from his past. She tried to steer the conversation back to Nugent’s death. ‘Mr Nesbit.’ She checked herself. ‘Jack.’ This was going to be awkward. No one liked to speak ill of the dead, but there had been rumour of a fallout between Nesbit and Nugent. It had been no secret that there was no love lost between the pair. Jack was old school. Nothing flash about him. He’d earned his stripes at a time when footballers earned a living wage, a time when clubs were made up from local lads who either cycled to and from the ground or caught the bus, even for important matches. The big money, the silly money that had come with TV rights and sponsorship, that sort of money had come later, much later.
‘How well did you know Harry Nugent?’
‘Honestly?’ He stretched out his legs, crossing them at the ankles. ‘Enough to know I didn’t like him.’
This was what she came here for, but Oonagh had to be careful how she handled this. ‘Not a fan then?’
‘I’ll not be rushing to pay my respects, that’s for sure.’ He finished his drink, eyeing the waiter for a fresh one.
Oonagh stirred her tea, taking a sip to give him enough breathing space to elaborate.
‘Did he suffer aye?’ He asked, waiting for Oonagh’s response before placing his empty glass on the table. ‘Good.’ A bead of sweat had formed on his top lip.
‘This wasn’t just a business fall out was it, Jack?’
‘Bastard. I hope he rots in hell.’
She rubbed her hand along the back of her neck, conscious of the muscle twitching in her jaw. ‘What did he do, Jack? What did he do that was so bad?’ She was careful not to put words in his mouth. So far the rumours were just that. Rumours.
The waiter stopped at the table, refreshing his drink, Jack nodded his thanks. ‘It wasn’t just me. The rest of them knew… they all knew.’ His voice rose just enough to cause the waiter to turn back round, but none of the other customers seemed to notice so he let it go, Oonagh gave him a weak smile, letting him know they were good.
‘Jack.’ She saw the raw emotion in his eyes. It might have been regret; it might have been too many years having a ball batter against his head. Perhaps he truly was losing it, but she couldn’t take the risk. She reached over and placed her hand on his. ‘What did he do, Jack? And who are “they”? Who’re you talking about?’
‘I picked him up.’ He kept his voice low this time, whether by accident or design Oonagh couldn’t tell. ‘By the shirt on his back. I grabbed him and dragged him out of that boardroom.’ Jack looked exhausted just by the memory, and wiped away the trace of spittle that had gathered on his lips. ‘I kicked his arse down those stairs. Bastard.’
Oonagh was trying to piece this together; she had no idea if this was the rambling of a confused old man or a real memory. ‘Who are you talking about, Jack?’
‘That bastard, Nugent.’ Jack Nesbit might have been a frail pensioner, but at that moment he looked ruthless. Oonagh was shocked to see the sheer venom in his eyes. ‘The whole lot of them,’ he said, ‘rotten to the core.’
She breathed deeply. She wasn’t going to like whatever was coming next, she guessed. ‘Please, Jack. Just tell me what he did.’
He sat back in his chair; suddenly the fight had gone out of him. Replaced instead with sadness. ‘He was touching those boys.’ He turned his head slightly, looked to the side. Jack Nesbit was from a generation that didn’t disc
uss such things. Certainly not in front of a woman. To him Oonagh looked like a wee lassie. She was younger than his daughter, he’d told her.
How many cover-ups? How many excuses? She wanted to shake him, ask why he hadn’t gone to the police, reported Nugent for being a paedophile. For wasting the lives of countless young boys. Kids who’d only wanted to play football but probably had their lives ruined because of pigs like Harry Nugent. Instead she took a deep breath, tried not to blame him, and asked, ‘Did you tell the police, Jack?’ knowing full well what the answer would be.
He dropped his head. ‘No.’ His voice was little more than a whisper. ‘No, hen, I didn’t, and that’s something I might regret to my dying day.’
The silence filled the void between them. She had no answer to that. If he expected her to speak first he’d be in for a long bloody wait. Oonagh folded her arms – she was going nowhere – and waited for him to continue. If he came out with some shite like ‘things were different in those days’ she was sure she’d be able to kick him from where she was sitting.
‘Och, we’d no proof. Can you imagine getting those laddies to stand in front of a copper and tell them that a queer had touched him up?’ Jack Nesbit clearly hadn’t got the email about the twenty-first century being well under way. ‘Anyway. We dealt with it. In house, that’s the way.’
She couldn’t quite see what he was getting at, but the shame of her own attack seeped through her body. She hadn’t gone to the police either. Twenty years might have passed but there were still nights when she woke in the wee small hours with the taste of that creep on her mouth. Moments when she could almost feel the weight of him pressing down on her again, forcing his hand between her thighs. She’d managed to fight him off, before he’d gone any further. Before any real damage was done – or so she’d thought at the time. Convincing herself that it wasn’t that bad. But what Nesbit was talking about was different. These kids didn’t have a choice.
The Quiet Ones Page 4