Silent Night: An absolutely gripping crime thriller

by Geraldine Hogan

  ‘Nothing new there, but…’ Byrne’s eyes hardened. ‘You can’t come in to work in that state. Go home, have a shower and a gallon of coffee. Feck’s sake, Ben, anyone could run into you here. The commissioner is next door this morning and you look like you belong in a cell rather than in one of our most elite teams.’

  ‘Yeah, well, it’s what happens when you’re doing real police work. Just because we’re not putting in for overtime doesn’t mean we’re not putting in the hours.’ Slattery hated the idea of being brought down a peg, especially by Byrne – time was when Byrne and plenty more of the big brass had looked up to Slattery. Still, he knew, a shower, a shave and a change of shirt probably wouldn’t go astray. Iris Locke had actually sniffed and moved away from him earlier in the incident room. Slattery smiled derisively at the recollection.

  ‘Before you go, any luck tracking down Boran?’ Byrne’s mouth lifted in something that Slattery assumed was meant to be a smile; he didn’t wait for an answer. ‘Just the wife picked up a couple of pen and ink drawings of local landmarks for the lady president’s prize.’ Now Byrne allowed his eyes to drift into the more familiar territory, waiting for Slattery to join up the dots.

  ‘He’s based locally? Where?’

  ‘That’s up to you to find out, but, they’re carrying his work in the Bridgend Gallery, down in Sarsfield Street – there can’t be that many Darach Borans around can there? He has to be your man.’

  ‘Mighty,’ Slattery said, ‘I’ll pass that along, obviously.’ He was thankful for the heads-up, but he’d have preferred if it had come from anyone but Byrne. June had reached a dead end in her search for Boran. Slattery assumed he’d left the country; he’d fulfilled the terms of his release conditions and walked away, free to start a new life. Now, if he had been living in Limerick for the past few months, Slattery had to wonder what kind of a new life he’d chosen. The death of Anna Crowe would suggest he was settling for more of the same.

  Iris sat down with her coffee. Dennis Blake had vanished from behind his desk, an unusual phenomenon. She couldn’t remember a time between eight in the morning and five in the afternoon since she’d arrived that he hadn’t been sitting there looking harassed. Maybe he finally had to take a leak, had to happen once every couple of days, she figured, snorting into her coffee as she thought about it. She looked around her. Apart from herself only McGonagle and June Quinn remained in the incident room. Slattery had left his phone on his desk. From the corner of her eye, she could see it light up while it rang once more on silent. Must be the sixth call in the last ten minutes, she thought. She got up from her desk, planning to turn it face down. It was a distraction she didn’t need. The caller was ‘Angela’ and she considered for a moment, wondering if maybe she should answer it. ‘June,’ she called across the room. ‘Should we answer this?’

  June Quinn waved her left arm; her face had a preoccupied expression as she continued to look at the screen before her. A mobile rested on her shoulder. At that, Slattery’s phone rang off and Iris picked it up considering. Angela. It was hardly connected to the investigation – was it? More like a wife, ringing to let him know she’d wormed the dog and not to bother doing it when he got home. She held the mobile in her hand for a second, considering a name like Angela. The notion that Slattery might have any life outside the Murder Team seemed unreal. He was all detective and if there was anything left over, Iris suspected it had long ago been discarded at some bar counter.

  She brought the phone across to June’s desk and dropped it there. She looked around the incident room: the crack that rose up beneath the windowsill and continued on to the roof following its own trajectory – the window was no obstacle in its path; the worn-out floors, sanded down by officers long gone; the feel of the desk, old and battered and ripped through with the scratches of time and hours spent poring over cases that may have eaten detectives up as much as this one felt like it might devour Iris. This old desk had probably been in this building since her father was here, maybe for as long as the police had moved in. The place was becoming too comfortable too quickly. Even the other officers, Westmont, Quinn and Blake – it felt as though she’d been working with them for months rather than days. Slattery and Grady were different, though – giving her a wide berth? No, preoccupied with the case – that was probably it. The gossip among some of the men was that a superintendent was going to transfer in from the Midlands, but that was only gossip. No one had any idea who was coming, but there was no doubt the whole station was understaffed. A murder team without a super, especially for a case like this, well, it was unheard of. She wondered why Grady wouldn’t put himself up for promotion; from where Iris stood, he seemed to fit the criteria perfectly – he was a male, about the right age, with an impressive career to date and the full team behind him and, oh yes, once more, he was male. She imagined that the thought of a newcomer would be enough to rattle some of the older boys. They had no names yet, but still, a new brush sweeps clean and it would mean change for everyone on the team. She shook the thoughts from her head. None of it made any difference to her. She wouldn’t be here to see it, probably. No doubt, they’d ship her out as soon as they had a full complement; God knows, she’d done enough hinting that she wanted Murder in Dublin. It was the right thing too, if it could be arranged. It was hard to see how she’d ever slip out of her father’s shadow in Corbally. Once more, Slattery’s phone caught her eye. It was ringing again – without thinking Iris rose from her seat to answer it.

  ‘Hi, I’m afraid Sergeant Slattery isn’t here just now…’

  ‘No, well, he wouldn’t be, would he?’ The voice on the other end sounded like a young woman, thirties, no more. Angela.

  June Quinn looked up; perhaps it was the irate voice on the other end of the phone, but she stopped mid-sentence and mouthed towards Iris, ‘Okay?’

  ‘Is it urgent? Can I get him for you? He’s interviewing a suspect at the moment.’ Iris heard her voice, calm and reasonable.

  ‘You might call it urgent. Perhaps you could tell him that his wife has been rushed to A&E after a car accident. If he can tear himself away, she’s down at St Dominic’s.’ Angela sighed anxiously and Iris reckoned the girl was on the verge of tears.

  ‘Of course I’ll get him. Is there anything else I can do for you? Is she going to be all right?’

  ‘I don’t know how she’s going to be, they won’t let me see her. Imagine, my own mother and…’

  ‘I’m sorry. I’ll get your dad straight away. He’ll be there before you know it.’

  ‘You mean you’ll tell him. God alone knows when we’ll see him.’ The girl hung up the phone, probably relieved that at least she’d managed to pass on the message. For one awful moment, Iris had glimpsed into another world. It was a world every guard carried with them; no matter where you ended up, at some point you had to give devastating news to a family and those moments never really left you. The loss or impending loss of others created a chasm so great it took in all around it like an enveloping and freezing fog.

  ‘What is it?’ June Quinn hung up the phone she’d been glued to for most of the morning.

  ‘It’s Slattery’s wife. She’s been in an accident. They want him down at St Dominic’s.’

  ‘Oh no.’ June’s eyes watered and then Iris knew that she had been fooling herself and she really wasn’t anywhere near part of this team yet. For all her empathy, there were years of relationships built up around her – like a net she’d probably never manage to break through. Only problem was, as each day passed, she was beginning to wonder if maybe she did want to be a part of it, after all.

  Chapter Nine

  Slattery turned over the box of John Player Blue in his sweaty hand. If Maureen were here now, she’d be doing his head in over smoking. Well, she was here, she was just beyond those double doors, through A&E, stretchered off as quickly as they could move her to an invisible part of the hospital. The operating theatres were behind locked doors. Even a detective couldn’t get in there; Slatt
ery couldn’t flash his badge, bully or push his way through. Nor did he want to. Angela could see it. Angela had always seen him for what he was. A fraud. Even when she was a baby, she’d looked up at him, with her shrewd stare and she had him sussed. He couldn’t relate to her after that; couldn’t look her in the eye. So he’d spent a lifetime – her lifetime – avoiding her. Until now. Now, they both knew the time had passed and it was too late.

  ‘Do you want to nip out for a smoke?’ she’d said in a neutral tone.

  He knew she didn’t expect him to come back. She was giving him an out. Did she want him to go? Is that what she really wanted? Or did she just want this terrible time to pass? And, maybe, without him there, she could breathe, she could text her husband, her friends, maybe have someone decent come and support her in her hour of need. Slattery considered it for a while, for the full six minutes it took him to smoke his fag and light up another. His whole body felt as if it was being pulled away from this place with its sterile interior, alien beeping noises and strangers who for a brief moment in time were thrown together through misfortune and misery. He wanted to be gone, every fibre in him wanted to be sitting at a bar counter somewhere, silently nursing a pint and a chaser. Could he go? Could he just leave Maureen and Angela, and turn his back on them one more time? He stood for a while, opened the pack of cigarettes again, better than running for the hills anyway; he lit another fag.

  ‘Slattery? Sad do, sorry about your missus, how’s she doing now?’ It was Vic Warren, ten years in the Traffic division and he still looked like a teenager. Perhaps there was something to be said for it, Slattery thought with a touch of bitterness. ‘We came in with her and—’

  ‘Any idea how it happened?’ Slattery asked. If Maureen was anything she was a careful driver, too careful if that was possible.

  ‘Well, the poor bastard in the other car isn’t going to be telling us now anyway.’

  ‘Shit.’ Slattery offered his smokes. He didn’t expect Warren to take one. When the younger man lit up hungrily, Slattery knew it had been a tough one.

  ‘Yeah, they just lost him. He was only nineteen years old, just started in college this year.’ Warren sucked in the night air, for all the good it’d do him.

  ‘You stayed with him?’

  ‘The family are driving down from Dublin; they’ll be here soon, too late now, though.’ He jerked the words out, looked towards the overcrowded car park. ‘So, how’s your missus?’ His voice was quieter, maybe fearing the worst; he must have seen she wasn’t in a great state coming in.

  ‘She’s had surgery. It’s a waiting game.’ Slattery dragged hard on his fag. ‘But she’s a tough auld bird, so…’ He wasn’t lying; she had to be made of serious metal to put up with his shenanigans all these years. Slattery nodded back towards the hospital. ‘Does anyone know what happened?’

  ‘Anyone there said she was completely in the wrong. Sorry.’ Warren spoke softly, but he was talking to Slattery, he had to be straight. He knew the man well enough to know that he wouldn’t thank him for anything less. ‘It’ll all be on camera, if you have the stomach for it, it happened just on the junction at O’Connell Street.’

  ‘Shit.’ The busiest corner in town, the only surprise was that more bodies weren’t on their way to Rafiq Ahmed. ‘So, what, she conked out, halfway?’ A likely scenario, Maureen was as apt to start in third as opposed to first gear.

  ‘Jesus, no.’ Warren took a final drag, turned to face Slattery, his expression filled with genuine sorrow. ‘Fuck me, Ben, she sat for three rounds of green lights, then took off like the clappers on a red; the boy had no chance.’ He patted Slattery on the back. He had to go, there was only so much brutal honesty he could impart at a time and he still had to face a dead boy’s family. ‘You’re lucky to have her, from what I’ve heard, Ben. Any of the witnesses there, well, they were sure she was a goner first.’

  Slattery pulled a final fag from the packet. He hardly tasted the tobacco this time. Maybe he could smoke himself to oblivion right here. He stood for a while longer, thinking of all the times he’d missed over the years with Maureen. Times like birthdays, anniversaries, Christmases. He could say he was in a state of regret. They passed through his mind, a sea of broken promises. It had started with Una. Maureen and his sister Una had been great friends. They left Limerick together before they should have even left school, they were hardly sixteen with grown-up jobs in Campion’s Tea House. Life must have seemed so simple then, until that terrible evening when Slattery’s world had fallen through a crack so slender he’d never seen it coming. Maureen returned following an afternoon shift serving up fancy cakes and coffees to people loaded down with shopping bags. She must have expected everything to be the same as when she’d left only hours earlier, but she returned to find Una’s body, in a strangled heap on the faded settee. That was when Maureen took to God and somehow, Slattery saw fit to take her under his wing. He still wasn’t sure if there was ever any romance, but there had been some tacit agreement that led them to the altar and in due course to a marriage as filled with emptiness as it was with disappointment. Eventually the rows had stopped, until she expected nothing more from him. They had made it to their silver wedding anniversary under the same roof; the following day, he moved into a flat at the top of the Ship Inn – it was, they all agreed, a natural progression. The flat was meant to be a stop gap, before he settled somewhere properly. The place was a kip, but at least he could come and go without an argument at every turn. She was welcome to the house in return for a bit of peace and quiet – he had a feeling the arrangement suited her more than she’d ever admit.

  He knew that going back into that hospital would make up for none of it. He was tempted to pull up his collar and disappear into the falling night. He stubbed out his cigarette, still in two minds. Something caught his eye, a reflection in the glass above. He strained his eyes to look closer, sure it was Maureen. He stood there for a moment, transfixed, was it all a terrible dream? Was she really patched up and marching around the hospital in one of her familiar grey cardigans? Then, something cold ran through him, as though ice had filled up in his veins. It was not Maureen, whatever he’d seen, or thought he’d seen, it wasn’t his Maureen. He turned, back through the emergency doors, it wasn’t too late to do the decent thing, and somehow, she’d managed to let him know that.

  ‘Sorry, I took so long…’ he said to Angela. She was still sitting where he’d left her, clutching two large handbags. He presumed one of them was Maureen’s.

  ‘It’s okay; sure you’re back now… I did wonder…’ Her voice trailed off.

  ‘Oh, yeah… well.’ He couldn’t look her in the eye, so he plonked himself down on the plastic seat beside her. It was going to be a long night; he had nothing to say to this stranger that was his own flesh and blood. But he was determined now to stay, even if it was in uncomfortable silence.

  It was hours before anyone came near them. When a woman in her forties, wearing faded scrubs, came towards them purposefully, Slattery’s heart lurched. He elbowed Angela beside him to make sure she was definitely awake.

  ‘Mr Slattery, Angela.’ She said their names as she pulled a chair from across the corridor to sit at an angle beside them. She looked then at Angela. ‘Your mother is out of surgery. We’ve managed to stop the clot, but she’s been well shaken up.’ Her words were slow, deliberate. This woman was used to giving bad news, same as Slattery.

  ‘Will she be okay?’ Angela’s voice sounded weak and worried beside him.

  ‘We really can’t say yet. I’m sorry. She’s done well to get this far. We’ll be holding on to her in a recovery room off ICU for the next few hours. Really, at this stage, you’d be better off going home.’

  ‘Is she… in any pain?’

  ‘No, she’s still under; she’ll be unconscious for the next twenty-four hours at least.’ She was matter of fact, but Slattery could see, behind her lightly creased blue eyes a deep compassion. She looked as if she too could have a family at home. H
er ring finger, naked now, was usually home to a stack of heavy bands, judging by the pale skin, taken off and probably left safe while she went about her work. ‘Look,’ she smiled now at Slattery, perhaps recognising he was the less emotional of them both, ‘better if you go home tonight. She’s stable for now. If there’s any change we’ll give you a call. But going in there, well, it just increases the risk of infection for her.’

  At that Slattery felt Angela let go a heaving unsteady sigh, defeated. They were going home.

  Grady scheduled the press conference for four o’clock and he asked Locke and Westmont to flank him at the top table. It was fairly obvious neither June nor Slattery would feel slighted, neither of them exactly had a face for TV. He had chosen the youngest and most attractive and if it was somehow not very PC, well, Iris wasn’t going to complain at least. He’d warned Westmont to keep his mouth shut, nodding as sagely as he could manage was the most he was allowed to do. Iris had a strict agenda. Her topic was the victim. Grady opened the conference with a set piece he’d already prepared. They wanted to convey that, although they were still pursuing a number of lines of enquiry, they had not made an arrest at this point and any additional information could really help them over the line.

  ‘So, Pat Deaver is not your man, then?’ A reporter from one of the red tops stood up with an anger that betrayed his avarice for a scoop.

  ‘We had a man help us with our enquiries, but that was all. He’s not a suspect at this time in the investigation.’ Grady was cool; he was carrying the pack of cards after all.

  ‘So, are ye near making an arrest?’ Another red-top reporter thrust a microphone nearer Grady’s face.

  ‘We are following several lines of enquiry at present and we are asking the public to come forward with anything at all that may be of help. I would like to stress that no matter how small it may seem to people, sometimes what appears like the most insignificant detail can be invaluable.’