by Andrea Mara
Would anyone have a screen shot of anything that would still have her photo? I asked.
Barry did – he’d taken a screen shot of the thread where we doled out the “footprint” cases we suspected were linked to the Blackwood Strangler, and he shared it in the group now.
I zoomed in, took a screen shot, and put it into a reverse-image search tool – it came up on a Pinterest account of someone called Becky O. I clicked through to her blog, where she talked about her grandmother and the sweet relationship she had with her. Her grandmother, the elderly lady in the photo, was called Doris, and lived in Cleveland, Ohio. She’d died six years ago.
Jesus. So Judith, the person we’d been chatting to for the last three years, didn’t exist. Then who the hell was behind the account?
My phone beeped. Jamie.
Alan not back, am out searching up your direction. Can you keep an eye out too?
I walked to the window, pulling the curtain back. The blanket of snow sat undisturbed, eerily bright under the night sky. Ethereal. Squinting, I tried to see out as far as the road. Was that something moving? I closed my eyes and opened them again, adjusting to the ghostly dark-light. There was definitely something moving out there. Not something, but someone. Alan? There was no way to tell in the darkness, but unease snaked through me as I stood staring. Stepping towards the front door, I flicked the switch for the porch light. Nothing happened, and I remembered now that I hadn’t changed it after the night Mick drove me back from drinks with Jamie. Did I have a spare somewhere? Swallowing, I opened the front door and reached up to remove the old bulb.
Only there was nothing there. Someone had removed it.
Shit. I stepped back and slammed the front door. Shit.
Is that you I just saw on the road near my house? I typed to Jamie. Or maybe it’s Alan? I saw someone outside.
Shaking, I sat back down to wait, but there was no reply. On my laptop, a Facebook message from Barry flashed up.
Marianne, are you ok? I’m worried about this – if Judith is not Judith, it could be someone you know. Can you think of anyone it might be? Someone close to you?
The unease ticked louder. I went to my room, and picked up the shotgun. Scared and ridiculous, I slid it behind the couch. I couldn’t tell if it was loaded and it would probably make any situation worse. But still. Maybe it would frighten him off. I sat down to wait for Jamie’s reply.
CHAPTER 67
Tonight
When the knock comes, I freeze. Every limb goes numb and all I can hear is white noise. The knock comes a second time, then a voice.
“Marianne? It’s Patrick. Are you okay?”
Jesus. I stand, and make my way to the door – it’s like walking through quicksand. I open it and let him in, closing it quickly behind him.
“Was that you outside on the road a few minutes ago?”
“Eh, I guess? Like just now?”
Was it just now? Or ten minutes ago? I can’t tell.
“Marianne, are you alright?”
“When I was looking out the window, I saw someone down on the road. Was it you?” I feel like I’m shouting, but I can’t tell.
“Oh God, sorry, yeah, it probably was – I didn’t mean to scare you. I had to leave the car half a mile down the road, outside Alan Crowley’s, too slippery to come up the hill in it. Nearly turned back. But I’d promised you that Geraldine or myself would come by. So I walked. Christ, I’m definitely not as fit as I thought I was.”
I let out a breath. “Sorry, I’m just a bit rattled tonight. So what is it – what’s the thing you wanted to tell me? I looked at the papers online and didn’t see anything.”
“Maybe you should sit down,” he says gently.
Shit. I sit down on the couch and he does too.
“Did you see a story about a man who was shot in a Dublin hotel?” he asks.
I nod, my throat tight, though I have no idea why or where this is going.
“Marianne, I’m so sorry, but it was Ray Sedgwick.”
Jesus. Ray. A million things go through my head.
I stare at Patrick, trying to take it in.
“Ray? Why? What happened?”
He shakes his head. “There aren’t a lot of details yet, but it seems he opened the door to someone and that person shot him. Do you have any idea who might do something like that? Someone with a grudge?”
I’m still staring, processing what he’s just said. What he’s just asked. Does he think I had something to do with it?
“Marianne?”
“I . . . I suppose there were grudges, yes, but nobody who would kill him.”
“I know about the feud with Alan.”
It’s a statement, but one that commands an answer.
“I can’t imagine . . . You surely don’t think Alan had anything to do with it, do you?”
“At the moment we have no idea at all, so we’re going to talk to everyone and anyone with a link to Ray, past and present.”
A beat.
“Is that why you’re talking to me?” I can hear the defensive tone but I can’t stop it. “You think I had something to do with it?”
Patrick puts his hands up, placating.
“We just need to speak to everyone and gather as much information as we can. That’s all. I called into Alan’s house on the way, but there was nobody there. I’ll try him on the way back. And Jamie.” There’s something about the way he says the last two words. An afterthought that’s not really an afterthought at all.
“Alan’s gone AWOL, and Jamie’s searching for him,” I tell him. “Up this direction I think – you didn’t see either of them?”
Patrick writes something in a notebook.
“What – why are you writing something?”
He hesitates. He’s holding something back, I’m sure of it.
“No need for alarm, but it’s worth considering there may be a link between Ray’s death and your footprint thing,” he says eventually.
“What?”
“We have to investigate everything, and it’s just one avenue.”
Which tells me precisely nothing.
I pull my laptop onto my knee and google Ray’s name. Nothing under “News”, but then there wouldn’t be if he hasn’t been named yet. Across the various stories about the murder in the Dublin hotel, there are some differing details, but for the most part, the reports are the same – a man, believed to be visiting from the United States, had been found dead in his room in a Dublin 2 hotel. Nobody heard anything when it happened, and the body wasn’t discovered until housekeeping came by this morning. Jesus.
“Is there any doubt?” I ask. “Any possibility it’s a mistake and it’s someone else? They don’t name him here . . . “
Patrick shakes his head. “I’m so, so sorry, Marianne,” he says, perhaps reading my horror as grief. “There’s no doubt. His publicist identified the body, and we’re in the process of informing friends and family. Nobody needs to find out something like this in the papers.”
I click into another report, a more up-to-date one that says the victim was due to travel to Wicklow today. God. I feel sick. A message from Barry pops through – asking if I’m okay after the whole Judith-is-not-Judith thing.
Am all over the place tbh, I reply. Have just found out the guy murdered in the hotel (maybe u saw news story) is someone I know.
Patrick clears his throat.
“Sorry, just reading the news reports about Ray. I’m still reeling. Do you need to go?”
“No, no rush, I just need to ask you a few more questions and the lads in Pearse Street Station – they’re the ones dealing with it – they’re trying to gather contacts for Sedgwick, other people we need to inform. Would you –” He stops as his phone rings and stands up to fish it out of his pocket.
“The station,” he mouths at me as he answers, and turns away.
I stick my head in my laptop but it’s impossible not to hear his side of the conversation.
“Yeah. When did h
e last see him? Jesus, not a great night to be out. I’ll have a look around near the farmhouse and either side. No bother. Right.”
He disconnects the call, puts his phone on the arm of the couch, and sits back down.
“That was Geraldine. Jamie called the station about his dad, still no sign of him. Have you had any interactions with him recently?”
“No. But I was away for a few days. I’m only back since Sunday night.”
“He’ll turn up, like a bad penny,” Patrick says, but he sounds worried.
That’s when we hear it.
A grating sound, like someone slipping. Coming from just outside the front door. I jump, and look over at Patrick. He gets up suddenly and puts his finger to his lips, then makes a stay-there motion with his hands. Quietly, he goes to the window, and peers through a tiny crack in the curtains.
Like lightning, he moves to the door and pulls it open. A blast of cold air comes in as he goes out, and the door shuts behind him. I am frozen to the couch, laptop sill on my knee, every cell of my body ice cold. Listening. The sound of one voice, then another. Shouting, but I can’t make out the words above the wind. Alan’s voice? Or Jamie’s? Louder now but still not clear. A bang, something hard against the door. And again. Jesus, I need to do something. Can I reach the shotgun? But my body won’t move. Shouting still, louder again. Then sudden quiet as the voices stop. Why? Too late I understand why.
The sound of a gun going off. Then silence.
CHAPTER 68
I will my legs to move, to get me off the couch and somewhere safe or anywhere else at all, but I’m paralysed, staring at the door.
As I watch, the handle turns.
I push myself back against the couch, closing my eyes.
“Marianne, it’s okay.”
Patrick. I let out a breath but still can’t move or find words.
“Marianne, it’s okay, he’s gone.”
Please say it wasn’t Jamie. Please say it wasn’t Jamie.
“Who?” I whisper.
“He had a shotgun.” His voice is shaking. “When I tried to get it from him, it went off. Jesus, what the hell was he thinking?”
“Patrick, who was it?”
“Alan. Marianne, there was nothing I could do – I had to try to get the gun. Jesus.”
“Oh my God. Will . . . will I call an ambulance?”
Patrick shakes his head. “There’s no need, it’s too late.”
I hear what he’s saying but it still doesn’t make sense.
“Alan’s dead?”
“Yeah. Jesus, why didn’t he just give me the gun?” He runs his hand across his head, pacing. “I phoned the station and Geraldine’s going to get the boys from Wicklow to come up. They’ll have to take a statement from me and from you. Christ. I’ve never . . . Christ!” He looks like a little boy.
I nod because that seems like the only possible response.
Patrick is still pacing, pale and sweating. “He must be the one behind your footprints. And Ray’s murder.”
I can’t tell if he really believes that, or if he needs it to be true, to justify what’s just happened. He lifts the curtain and looks out. I’m still glued to the couch under my laptop, too numb and shaky to offer him tea or brandy or whatever you might give a person who’s just shot someone.
And then I see it.
The faintest, tiniest light. Small but unmistakable. Half hidden by a cushion, having slipped off the arm of the couch. A phone. Patrick’s phone.
A sick feeling takes hold, twisting and coiling, spreading like lava. Didn’t he just say he called the station outside? How, if his phone was here all the time? Maybe he has a second phone?
I replay what happened, and it starts to feel like he arrived back inside just seconds after the shot was fired. How could he have made a call in that time? And shouldn’t he have stayed with the body? As I sit looking at him, he reaches up to wipe condensation from the window, and his jacket rides up a little. Underneath, the briefest glimpse of something black and metallic before the jacket covers it again. A gun? Alan’s maybe? But Patrick had said Alan had a shotgun, so that doesn’t make sense. And Patrick is just a regular garda – they didn’t carry guns. Maybe I imagined it . . . maybe it wasn’t a gun.
“I’ll try to get those contacts you needed – for Ray,” I say, my voice sounding scratchy.
“Thanks, Marianne,” Patrick says, turning to look at me, then back to the window. I shift so I’m sideways, my back to the arm of the couch, my screen turned as far away from Patrick as possible.
On my laptop, I click into Google and search “Patrick Maguire Garda Carrickderg”, mis-typing the words three times before getting them right. My breathing speeds up. I need to slow it down or he’ll notice. The search results are swimming in front of my eyes and nothing is useful but I don’t even know what I’m looking for.
A message.
I’m so sorry about your friend’s death – is there anything I can do?
Barry.
Barry, I need your help, urgent, might be in trouble. Can you search Garda Patrick Maguire, see if any link to Ray Sedgwick or Alan Crowley or me? Garda based here in Carrickderg but city centre before.
I hit send and open a second browser to hide the message.
Patrick turns and walks towards the couch – I open my email and scroll through my contacts, though he can’t see my screen. He sits, frowns, looks down at the couch, then picks up his phone. My stomach clenches in a tight ball. Does he realise his mistake? My eyes stay firmly on the screen, and the only sound is his breathing. Is he still looking at me? I don’t know and I can’t look up.
“Any luck with the contacts?”
“Not yet,” I try to say, but the words catch in my throat. I cough to cover up, and try again. “Not yet, still looking.”
He goes back to the window, phone in hand this time. I flip my browsers, and find replies from Barry – short, staccato replies, he’s typing as he reads.
Patrick Maguire, from Bray, college in Templemore, stationed in Store Street.
Transferred to Bray then on to Carrickderg.
?? This any help?
I type back: Link to me, Ray, Alan??
I flick to my email again just as Patrick steps away from the window and comes to sit on the couch. He seems jumpy but then anyone would be after a shooting.
“It’s starting to snow again,” he says. “In that wind it’ll be a real blizzard. We’re not cut out for this.”
I nod and keep my head down.
“Were you and Ray still in touch?” he asks.
“No, I haven’t seen him since the night he left, ten years ago.”
“Really?”
Again I nod, and brave a look at Barry’s messages.
No link yet, sorry, will keep looking. What ‘s going on?
I answer: He is in my house, have bad feeling. He is a guard but I think might be the one – the footprints.
Barry asks: Will I call the police?
He IS the police,I reply.
He says: Ok then I call police and say there’s a man in your house. Right? I’ll take blame – all my fault, if you’re wrong.
Yes. Do it, thank you.
Relief spins around me like a cloak but only for a second before it slips away again – how soon will the police get here in this weather?
“Do you mind if I make tea?” Patrick asks after a few minutes.
“Sure, I can do it!” If I’m in the kitchen, I can get out the back door while the kettle boils. Is the backdoor locked? I think yes, but the key is in the keyhole. And there are boots beside the door.
“No, you keep going with that, I need the distraction anyway.”
Is there something in the way he says it? Does he know what I was thinking? I can’t tell. He gets up and goes to the kitchen. Barry has sent new messages.
Have called police, they will send car as best can in snow. Still searching re Patrick Maguire
Through the open kitchen door comes the soun
d of cups and spoons. I look at the front door – if I’m quiet, I can make it across the room without him seeing me. He’ll hear the door, but then I’ll be gone. Gently, I push the laptop off my knee and unfold my legs, touching my bare feet to the floor. I don’t know how far I’ll get in the snow without shoes, but I have to try.
I stand, just as Patrick comes back into the room with two teas.
“All okay, Marianne?” he asks, and there’s something harder in his voice now. Something pointed.
“Pins and needles.” I stretch, calculating quickly in my head – if I can’t get out, I need the laptop and access to Barry. I sit and pull the laptop onto my knee in one fluid movement that I hope looks relaxed.
Patrick stands watching for a second longer than necessary. Then he sits too, putting the teas on the coffee table.
“Oh crap, I put milk in yours,” he says. “Sorry, I should have asked!”
“That’s grand,” I say. “I take milk.”
He sounds exactly as he always does, Patrick Maguire, local garda in nothing-ever-happens Carrickderg. Jesus, he probably has two phones, he’s probably allowed to carry a gun, and I’m letting years of true crime creep into real life.
Barry’s next message comes through.
His dad Robert Maguire, in the army, dishonourable discharge after a random drug test.