The Silent Dead (Paula Maguire 3) (21 page)

‘I suppose so.’ It was just paper, after all. Names and dates and faces of the lost.

‘I’m not saying I know anything, now. I’ll think. It might just be from posters or that. If I remember, how do I get you?’

‘Tell the governor,’ said Paula. She didn’t want this man knowing her number, or anything about her. And yet he might be the only person who could help.

‘OK.’ He was done. ‘I’ll have a wee think. No immediate bells.’

‘All right. Thank you.’
Thanks for telling us who you might have murdered, Sean!
What a mad post-conflict world it was. She took a breath. ‘You may also have heard that the mayor’s gone missing.’

‘Kenny? Aye, I heard someone lifted him. Not surprising, really.’

‘No?’

‘Aye, he was talking about taking his seat in Westminster. Swearing the oath to the Queen and all. That’d annoy a lot of people.’

‘Is there anything you could tell us about that?’

‘Ah, no. I know the background. But you’ve come to the wrong place if you think I know anything more. Sure I’ve been stuck in here over a decade.’

She watched him; quailed before his stare. ‘I’ll . . . if you think of anything, perhaps you’d let us know.’

Paula rapped on the door to show they were finished, and Sean placed both wrists on the table. ‘
An bhfuil Gaeilge agat?
’ He asked it quietly, not looking at her. Anyone listening might have missed it over the buzzing of the door.

Paula froze with her back to him. She nodded very slightly. Yes, she spoke some Irish.

‘
Tá sí do mháthair?
’ Is she your mother?

Maguire. Of course. For fuck’s sake. It was written on the badge round her neck. She had the same name, same face, same hair.

She turned to look at him, mute. His face was very strange. Interested. Compassionate, maybe. He nodded, as if seeing something that satisfied him. Then the guard was coming in and leading him out. ‘Good luck with the baby, miss,’ called the man who’d murdered five people. That they knew of, at least.

Kira

The office was much nicer than she’d thought. There was a machine with water and plastic cups, and a thick blue carpet. His assistant asked them all did they want tea or coffee, and Kira said coffee to look grown up, and when it came it was black and horrible but she drank it anyway.

‘Welcome,’ he said, briskly, shaking her hand, then Dominic’s, then Ann’s. ‘It’s an honour to have you here. And please accept my condolences for your loss. We’re all united in condemnation of such a brutal act.’

Kira was a bit confused about it, but she knew this man had been in the IRA too – everyone knew that, though they weren’t allowed to say so on the news, they had to call him Mayor Jarlath Kenny, and talk about how he was going to run to be their local MP. But maybe he’d killed some people too. Not everyone in the group knew they were here, because of that, but Dominic just said something about strange bedfellows.

‘I wanted to meet you as representatives of the group and say that if I’m elected I will of course pursue all avenues of compensation available to you.’

‘What about legal avenues?’ said Ann in her dry, cross way.

‘The five suspects were acquitted,’ Kenny said.

‘We know that, we were there. But they are clearly guilty.’ Dominic sounded annoyed, underneath his ‘talking to official people’ voice.

‘There’s little we can do if the justice system has played out,’ said Kenny, and he really sounded sad. ‘I think the key now is to focus on the memorial, and ensuring this doesn’t happen again by supporting the peace process.’

‘So you’re saying we have to accept the verdict?’

‘What else can we do, Mr Martin?’ Kira didn’t like the way he was saying
we
, like it was something to do with him. ‘The civil trial option is so expensive and gruelling, are you sure you’d want to put yourselves through that . . .’

Dominic caught her eye. It was up to her now. Kira leaned forward. Outside in the office there were people typing, phones ringing, chatter and the odd laugh. ‘We have another idea,’ she said quietly. ‘Mr Kenny, we want you to help us with something.’

Chapter Twenty-Four

Paula lumbered back to the unit, in a thoroughly foul mood as a soaking May rain fell over the town, the mugginess of the day finally broken. The working day was nearly over, but the team had been on near-constant duty. They were short on manpower with Bob’s suspension – her fault, though hardly the outcome she’d expected – and she was needed there. There were still two bombers to find as well as Kenny. That was what mattered. Find the lost things, put them back where they belonged, and everything would fall into place, and it wouldn’t matter about Aidan being up at the hospital at Maeve’s bedside, or about the fact she’d had to look at a dead woman that no one cared enough to find, or the impending birth of her child, which could not be gotten around without going through, or that she’d just come face to face with the man who maybe knew what had happened to her mother. None of that would matter at all, if she just kept looking.

Back at the unit the mood was equally sombre. The band of journalists who’d been door-stepping the unit had scattered in the rain, sheltering in the coffee shop opposite. Inside Avril and Fiacra sat at their desks in rigid silence, where once they would have played music or made each other cups of tea or gossiped in a familiar undertone that could make you feel like a total outsider. Every few minutes the phone buzzed with an irritating three-note cheep. No one picked it up. Paula glanced at it, wondering why. ‘What’s the latest?’

‘Oh, the usual.’ Avril didn’t look up from her clacking keys. ‘I checked with the hospital and you were right, Flaherty’s dying of stage four lung cancer. He’d been offered palliative care but refused any treatment or pain medication.’

She put her bag down on the chair, frowning. What did it mean? He was dying, and his house had been left so neat and tidy, and he hadn’t gone in the van with the other bombers – so where was he?

‘Boss wants to see you,’ said Fiacra, also not looking up.

Paula sighed. ‘In his office?’

‘Yeah, and the DCI is there too.’

Avril looked up. ‘Are you in trouble, Paula?’

‘I guess I’ll find out, won’t I?’ She trudged to the office, rubbing her aching back, knocked on the door and went in. ‘What’s the problem?’

Corry and Guy were very still, he at his desk, she standing by the window.

Paula saw a look pass between them and some feeling went pop inside her. ‘Is something wrong?’

‘Sit down, Dr Maguire. Shut the door.’ Corry.

That phrase again. ‘I’d rather stand, if you’re going to. Is someone going to tell me what’s going on?’

Another look. Guy placed his hands on the desk. ‘We think there’s a leak in the investigation.’

‘The notes,’ said Corry. ‘No one is supposed to know about them. So how come Dominic Martin was able to quote them back to me?’

‘It could just be coincidence. Those phrases were in the public domain, after all. Or maybe, like I’ve always said, he wrote them and we just haven’t been able to prove it.’

Another look. Corry placed something on the desk. ‘There’s also this.’

It was a page from the
Ballyterrin Gazette
. She’d largely stopped reading it because it only made her cross with Aidan. He was always sticking the boot into the police somehow, and the unit was often the focus of his scorn. Aidan didn’t believe in offering immunity to terrorists, even if it helped find the bodies of the lost, and was furious they were working with the Commission for the Disappeared. The story was about the Mayday Five – he’d plastered it with their pictures, and Maeve’s book was also detailed, accompanied by a stern but beautiful picture of her leaning against a wall with her arms folded. The Mayday Five were all named as the perpetrators of the bomb.

‘That’s libel,’ she said absently.

‘You can’t libel the dead,’ said Corry tersely. ‘Three of them are in the morgue, in case you forgot. Look at page six – he knows about the notes.’

She peered at it. ‘Oh. That’s not good.’

‘We were keeping that back on purpose, so we could eliminate suspects. Now that’s blown. Now the
Gazette
has it it’ll be all over the media.’

She looked up at them, Corry glaring with folded arms, Guy frowning down at his desk. ‘I see. You think I did this?’

Corry stared her down. ‘Dr Maguire. We’re aware of your – relationship with the editor of the paper. I’m afraid we have to ask you formally if you have allowed him access to any of the case notes. It wouldn’t be the first time, would it?’

She opened her mouth. Guy jumped in. ‘He could have got them himself. Perhaps it wasn’t even your fault.’

‘Aidan wouldn’t do that! He’s an old-fashioned journalist. He gets people to talk, he doesn’t go through their things.’

Corry sighed. ‘Paula. This is very serious; I don’t need to tell you that. May I remind you that the unit has had this case for over a month and so far you haven’t found any of the missing alive? All we have is dead bodies, and now the mayor, the actual mayor of the town, is also missing. I’d say that for a missing persons unit, that constitutes a pretty big failure. And I’m not doing much better – we’ve got eyewitness testimony against Kenny and what sounds like some of the Mayday families, but we haven’t been able to pin a thing on them. Why is this happening? I should have realised sooner there might be a leak. The damn phone’s been ringing off the hook all morning since this came out.’

‘It isn’t me,’ Paula said stonily. ‘I’m doing my best to find them. You were the one who said I was working too hard on the case!’

‘Does he have access to your phone?’ Guy asked the question uncomfortably.

She quelled him with a glare. ‘I haven’t seen Mr O’Hara for a number of weeks – except in hospital, where we were a bit more concerned about our friend who’s seriously injured. Aside from our family connection, which is hardly rare in a town this size – half the PSNI are related to someone – we are not in contact, and he certainly could not get access to my work email. Your leak is somewhere else.’ She leafed through the paper. ‘Can I take this?’

Corry was pursing her lips, looking at Guy to say something. Paula didn’t wait for an answer – she took the paper and stalked out, allowing the door to close that bit harder than usual behind her.

‘Why do you do it?’

In the past Aidan would have greeted her with a sarky comment, a lippy remark, and that would have been them away, trading insults. What passed for flirting, with them. But now he gave her a look that was fast becoming familiar, his eyes moving straight to her bump, avoiding her gaze. ‘Can I help you?’

Paula had found him in her least favourite place, Ballyterrin General Hospital, and she’d made herself go up to where Maeve lay in the ICU. There was an officer on the door but she’d argued her way in, all five foot ten of her and two extra stone of baby. Aidan was sitting outside the glass-walled private room, his head in his hands. She said, ‘The notes. How did you know?’

He looked at the paper she was slapping against the seat. ‘The notes in the mouths?’

‘Yes of course the bloody notes in the mouths. That was deliberately withheld, and now you’ve plastered it all over the paper. Who told you?’

‘I hope that’s not a serious attempt to get me to reveal my sources. You should know I don’t do that.’

‘Aidan. They think I told you. They even think you might have gone through my phone. I might get suspended.’

‘Why would they think that?’

‘Because hardly anyone knows, and you and me, we’re – you know.’

He scratched his neck – he needed a shave, and a haircut. His dark hair flopped over the collar of his Springsteen T-shirt. ‘Look, Maguire, I don’t reveal sources, not for anyone. But in this case it was an anonymous tip-off. I’m no wiser than you. Look.’ He took out his phone and called up an email, passed it to her, the address just a string of numbers – 010506. The name on the email said A Source.

Paula thumbed through it, frowning. ‘Someone trying to be clever?’

‘I didn’t ask. There’s scans of the notes, the lot.’

‘Why would someone do this?’

‘You’re the psychologist, Maguire.’

‘They must be working with us. Only a police insider would know this – or else the killer. Look, I’m going to have to take this to Corry and Brooking. They need to know.’ She thought suddenly of Fiacra, his angry truculence, the sneakiness of what he’d done to Avril. But he wouldn’t damage the investigation – would he? She fell silent, following Aidan’s gaze to the room where Maeve lay, the machines still breathing for her. A woman with a short dark bob bent over her, talking, even though Maeve clearly could not hear. ‘Is she . . .’

‘She’s all right,’ Aidan said. ‘Not that you asked. She hasn’t woken up yet but . . . they’re hopeful.’

‘I’m sorry. I did phone to check on her. I just . . . couldn’t be here.’

‘I noticed.’

‘Why did you use it?’ she burst out. ‘This isn’t the first time you’ve bollixed up a case for us by printing stuff. Don’t you ever realise it might mean justice isn’t done?’

Aidan turned back to the room. He seemed too distant these days to even fight with her, as if vital circuits were shorted out on their old connection. ‘Was it justice when those Five walked free from court, tell me? I’ve my own brand of justice – telling people the truth, and letting them decide.’

‘People. The mob, you mean.’

‘Maybe. And you’ve your own brand, too, and as I recall it isn’t always the exact definition of the law.’

‘Oh for God’s . . .’ She stopped.

‘What?’ He followed her gaze.

She stared at the screen of the phone in her hand. ‘The numbers – it’s the date of the bomb. First of May, 2006. It’s the bomb.’

Aidan’s forehead creased. ‘Why would someone send us this?’

‘Publicity. The notes were done for a reason. My guess is someone doesn’t want this dismissed as an IRA feud. They want the punishment to be seen. To get their voices heard.’

‘Like a public hanging.’
‘Exactly like that.’ She thought of Dominic Martin’s angry words after the trial.
They should be strung up
 . . .
My daughter didn’t have much of a voice.

Aidan rubbed a hand over his face. ‘What do you think’s going on here, Maguire? Your instincts are usually right, even if you do run off on some awful half-cocked missions sometimes.’

‘You’re one to talk. Honestly – and this is hard to admit, knowing what I know – I think the families did it. Dominic Martin definitely knows something, and there’s this teenage girl, Kira Woods, she’s only thirteen but she knows something. I’m sure of it.’

‘Who else?’ Aidan was hunting through his jeans pockets, pulling out a pen and receipt to scribble on. Paula heard the words pour out of her, as if the pressure of not talking to him about the case was piling up in her and had to burst. He had all the evidence now, so why not tell him everything, see if he could help as he had before?

‘Ann Ward, she’s the secretary, she had the same notebooks as we found at the caves, same ones the notes were written on. She handed them over to us bold as brass. Lily Sloane, the girl who lost an eye – she’s tied up in it, I’d say, even if she doesn’t know the whole story. I’m pretty sure John Lenehan knows what’s going on. Dominic Martin even has a white van, just like we found on CCTV. It was just parked outside his house in plain view. But we’ve not been able to prove any of it. They’re getting away with it somehow.’

‘Like the bombers did.’

‘Exactly. A crime in plain sight, but somehow you walk free.’

‘Maybe that’s the idea.’

Paula thought about this for a moment. ‘If that’s so, then . . . shit.’ Her own phone was ringing in her bag. Guy, checking up on her?

The ring was very loud; the woman with the dark bob was coming to the door to complain. ‘Those aren’t allowed in here.’ She didn’t introduce herself.

‘Sorry, sorry,’ Paula said. She moved to the corridor and answered it. ‘Dr Maguire.’

‘Maguire?’ It was Gerard. ‘Where are you?’

‘Checking up on a few things.’

‘Well, you can’t moan no one tells you about bodies if you’re not around when it happens.’

‘There’s another body?’ She saw Aidan’s face change; he’d overheard.

‘Aye. A woman. Can you get here now? I’ll text you the details.’

‘I’m on my way.’ She hung up.

Kira

The courthouse was suffocating her. People everywhere, cameras going off, reporters with microphones and notebooks, families crying. She recognised Ann Ward, shaking, one of her sons holding her up. Lily Sloane shouting,
No, no, it’s not fair
, as her parents led her away. She couldn’t see Mammy. Dominic had told her to go away, go home, but she didn’t know how to get home, and anyway, it wasn’t home without Rose, it never would be again. Kira sank down on the hard wooden bench in the middle of the big hall, echoing with shouts and feet and flashes of light from cameras. Everything was spinning. Everything had fallen apart.

Not Guilty. They’d said Not Guilty.

‘It’s not FAIR,’ she said out loud, her voice swallowed up in the noise.

‘I know it’s not.’ She looked up. A man was standing over her. She didn’t know him, didn’t recognise him as one of the relatives. He was very tall, with hair the colour of sand. He was wearing a blue jumper and jeans.

‘You’re Kira,’ he said.

She nodded. People often knew her from TV and that.

‘What if I told you this didn’t have to be the end?’

She didn’t know what to say. ‘We already said we wouldn’t take it further. We don’t have any money.’

‘I’m not talking about something that costs money.’

The man sat down beside her in the crowded courtroom, and what he said to her then meant nothing was ever going to be the same again.