The Slowest Cut (3 page)

Chapter Four

John cast a final glance at the cadaver, then pulled off his gloves and ripped the plastic apron from around his waist. Eileen Carragher’s body had given up every secret that it held; her mind was Marc’s business. Davy and Des would tell them what sort of knife had done the damage, and the swabs, bloods and stomach contents would say if she’s been sedated, or given pain relief while she’d been hacked to death. His money was on no. Something about the brutality of Carragher’s end said that her killer would have wanted her to feel every slice. They’d wanted her to suffer and she had.

John walked towards his office to leave the post-mortem recording for typing-up, then slung his suit jacket over his shoulder and headed for the car and home. Natalie was working tonight so he’d get a good night’s sleep to clear his head and he would look at the case again tomorrow, refreshed. All the signs said the body belonged to Eileen Carragher, but until they had a formal identification he couldn’t sign her off. There was no way her husband could I.D the raw meat on the table as his wife, so it would be down to DNA.

John stopped in his tracks, shocked again at his forgetfulness that day. He’d forgotten to ask Liam to get her toothbrush or hairbrush for a DNA match! Then he smiled. Liam would do it instinctively. Sadly he was too well versed in identifying bomb-blasted remains not to know the drill.

John started the engine of his Chrysler Crossfire and drove slowly towards the Lisburn Road and past Fitzwilliam Primary School on his way home. He was thinking of food and bed, but at the back of his head another, more personal, topic was lurking. He’d think about it tomorrow. Once he was sure his hangover hadn’t been making him sentimental and leading him astray.

***

Liam looked at the steep flight of stairs in front of him and sighed. He was getting to the age where bungalows had started to look appealing, the last thing he needed was to have to climb twenty steps up to someone’s front door. What eejit had designed town houses anyway? With the garage and kitchen at ground level and the front door a storey above. It wasn’t natural. His daughter Erin had a picture book about an upside-down house and that’s where they belonged.

Liam clambered laboriously up the high steps, his one concession to keeping fit not to hold onto the rail. If he could still ascend without doing that, then the Zimmer frame was a few years away yet. He’d just raised his hand to knock when the door opened inwards and a sixty-something man with a bad comb-over stood in front of him. Liam dwarfed him, but then at his height he dwarfed nearly everyone.

“Mr Carragher?”

“Yes. You must be D.C.I. Cullen. Please come in.”

Liam composed his face in an appropriately solemn expression and entered a long, carpeted hall. Ian Carragher nodded him into the small front room and turned to go. “I won’t be a moment. I’ll just make the tea.” He scurried off down the stairs into the kitchen, upsetting Liam’s sense of spatial rightness once again and leaving him to wander around the modern living room, examining papers and ornaments with a well-trained eye. When he heard Carragher’s footsteps on the stairs again Liam sat down in an armchair, with an innocent look on his face.

“I hope you like cake, Mr Cullen. Eileen made some last week.”

It was said matter-of-factly, without any sign of grief, confirming Craig’s earlier opinion. Carragher didn’t know his wife was dead. He hadn’t been asked to I.D. the corpse they’d seen earlier that day, so as far as he was concerned she was probably just missing. Liam made a note to ask him for her toothbrush and gratefully accepted the proffered tea.

After a few seconds of sipping and two pieces of cake, Liam reminded himself why he was there and set down his cup. He removed his tiny notebook from his pocket and readied himself to ask questions in a way that implied he didn’t already know the answers.

“Did you see your wife over the weekend, Mr Carragher?”

“Yes, on Friday night and Saturday morning. She went into town in the afternoon to meet a friend. When she didn’t come back I reported her missing.”

Liam nodded. He’d already checked whether Carragher had reported her missing, so that his other questions wouldn’t sound out of place. He had; on Sunday. Liam asked another question whose answer he already knew.

“When was that?”

“Yesterday, at about two p.m.”

“Who did you speak to?”

“A Sergeant Harris at High Street station. I thought as Eileen had disappeared in town that I should report it there. Was that OK?”

“Yes, quite OK.”

It was more than OK, it was positively handy. Jack Harris was a mate of his from training college and Craig often used his interview rooms on a case. He’d get far more than facts from Jack; he’d get his impression of Ian Carragher’s guilt or innocence, and what state he’d been in when he’d reported his wife gone.

He turned back to Carragher, scrutinising his round face. He didn’t look like a man who’d offed his wife, but you never knew. Murderers rarely looked like murderers. That comb-over could be concealing evil thoughts.

“Who was your wife meeting in town on Saturday?”

“An old friend.”

“Male or female?”

Liam asked it deliberately provocatively, to see if jealousy might play an element in the case. He wouldn’t like it if Danni was meeting an old male friend, and he thought that it would niggle at most men. Not Ian Carragher.

“Male. I think his name was Gerry Warner. Something that started with a ‘W’ anyway.”

“And that didn’t bother you?”

Carragher looked blank. “What?”

“That she was meeting another man?”

Carragher looked at Liam as if he was a Neanderthal and Liam suddenly blushed. Danni was always telling him he was old-fashioned and even Craig had hinted at it once or twice, although his Italian half seemed to understand jealousy. But in front of this older man with bad hair Liam felt almost embarrassed. Carragher’s tone became frosty.

“I trust my wife implicitly. She can be friends with whomever she wishes.”

Liam bristled. “Aye, that’s all very well. But you didn’t report her missing until two o’clock yesterday. Does that trust extend to her being out all Saturday night?”

Carragher sat back in his chair and the movement told Liam that something he’d said had hit a nerve. When Carragher spoke again his modulated tenor had risen several tones.

“Yes. Of course it does. She probably wanted to continue their chat and then realised the time and decided to stay in town. Perhaps they had breakfast together.”

“I don’t believe that, Mr Carragher, and neither do you, or you wouldn’t have reported her missing at all.” Liam paused and shifted tack. “What do you do, Mr Carragher?”

“I’m a surveyor. I work for Taylors in town.”

“So you wouldn’t have met any of your wife’s old college friends?”

“Yes, I’ve met them. We’ve gone to reunions over the years.”

“And this Gerry? Had you met him?”

Carragher paused, as if he was considering what to say. The answer was yes or no. Simple. Except that the look on Carragher’s face said he was working out the ramifications of each. Interesting. After a moment he plumped for yes.

“Yes, I met him several times at college dos. He was on the organising committee.”

Good. That would make him easier to find. Now came the bit that Liam hated. He altered his posture and softened his deep voice to mimic sympathy, except that he didn’t feel any for the man in front of him and he couldn’t quite work out why. His wife was dead and he’d done everything right. Ian Carragher was an easy-going husband who didn’t mind his wife meeting male friends for a catch-up. He went to boring college reunions and supported her career, and he’d reported her missing within a reasonable time. So why didn’t he believe that he was completely guiltless in her death? Liam shrugged. Maybe it was just his suspicious mind.

“Mr Carragher, I have some potentially bad news.”

Carragher’s eyes widened and he lurched forward in his seat. “What? Have you found Eileen? Is she hurt?”

The questions and reactions of an innocent man. They felt real. Ian Carragher hadn’t killed his wife after all, but did he know who had?

Liam restarted more slowly; certain now that he was dealing with a widower not a murderer.

“We’ve found a body.”

“Is it Eileen? Is it?”

Carragher’s voice was reaching screeching pitch and Liam tried to calm him down. “We don’t have an identification yet, Mr Carragher. It wasn’t possible. So we’re going to have to use DNA. Could I have something of your wife’s to compare? Her toothbrush or perhaps a comb?”

But there was no calming the man opposite. “What do you mean it wasn’t possible? Either it looks like my wife or it doesn’t.”

Carragher stood up so quickly that Liam recoiled, immediately preparing for an attack. But he merely rushed past Liam to the mantelpiece and lifted a picture of a couple, thrusting it in his face. It was Carragher and his wife. It was the first time Liam had seen Eileen Carragher’s face, other than as a mutilated corpse. She looked pleasant. A plump-faced woman wearing a floral dress and a smile. Nothing like the cadaver he’d seen earlier that day.

Liam shook his head, not wanting to tell the man the full horror of their discovery.

“I’m sorry, Mr Carragher. It isn’t possible to say that the body we’ve found resembles this lady.”

Carragher screamed in Liam’s face. “So what makes you think this body has anything to do with Eileen at all? It could be anyone, but you come in here randomly, scaring the life out of me and asking for samples of DNA. You ought to be ashamed…”

Liam let him rant for a moment then stood and placed his hands gently on Carragher’s shoulders, pressing him to sit down.

“It isn’t a random visit, Mr Carragher, and I’ll tell you why. The reason we feel this might have something to do with your wife is because of where and how the body was found.”

Carragher went to ask where, but Liam stilled him with a look.

“I can’t tell you any more, sir. I’m sorry. Please just give me the samples I’ve asked for and then let me get someone to come and stay with you until we find some answers. Is there anyone you can call?”

Carragher stared at the ground for so long that Liam thought he’d been struck dumb. Finally he whispered “My son, Ryan. He lives off the Ormeau Road.”

“Good, give me his number. I’ll call him and explain, while you get those items for me.”

Carragher motioned Liam towards an address book then stood slowly, heading for the bedroom with his energy seeping visibly away. Liam compared him to the cheerful man who’d answered the door and made the tea thirty minutes before, and shook his head for the thousandth time at the power of grief.

***

Craig hung up the phone and pulled open his office door, walking out onto the squad-room floor. He really wanted to gaze out his window at the river, but he avoided it these days. Since he’d split with Julia it made him maudlin, the Lagan’s water too dark a place to go. He strode across to Davy’s desk.

“Do you have a minute, Davy?”

Davy spun round from his computer so quickly that his long hair caught in his mouth. As he pulled it out Craig noticed that his nails were unpainted these days. He stared at him more closely; something else was different as well. It took him a while to work out what it was and then finally he did; he was wearing a shirt and tie! Davy’s usual office attire was a T-shirt and jeans and always dark, but today he was wearing a white shirt, a red tie and if Craig wasn’t mistaken his trousers were part of a suit. His heart sank. It could only mean one thing; Davy had an interview. He kept his tone light and asked.

“Are you leaving us, Davy?”

Davy shot him a puzzled look and Craig went on.

“The way you’re dressed. It’s not your usual gear. That usually means interviews.”

Davy stared blankly at him then glanced down at his shirt and laughed. “This? No, it’s not for an interview. Maggie’s been nagging me to s…smarten up, so I finally have.”

Davy had been dating Maggie Clarke; a reporter with the Belfast Chronicle, for over a year and her influence on him so far had all been good. Nicky overheard their conversation and wandered across the floor.

“I think it suits him. Don’t you?”

Craig grinned. “Yes, I do. Even more now that he’s not thinking of leaving us.”

Davy was only twenty-six but he was the best analyst that Craig had ever worked with. And, while he knew they couldn’t hold onto him forever, he was going to give it a damn good try.

Davy smiled mysteriously. “Ah, now. I didn’t s…say that, chief.”

Nicky saw Craig’s face fall and she clipped Davy playfully around the ear. “For God’s sake don’t wind him up. He’s been hard enough to live with lately.”

As soon as the words were out Nicky realised what she’d said and scrambled frantically for a retreat. Craig smiled at her confusion and raised a hand, calming her down.

“Don’t panic, Nick. You’re right. Like I said this morning, I know I’ve been a pain in the ass since before Christmas. I’m surprised no-one called me on it weeks ago.”

Davy interjected. “W…we were going to draw straws this week for it. Nicky had them all ready to go, but then you got better by yourself.”

Nicky flushed. “Davy Walsh! I’m never telling you a secret again. You just wait. I’m going to tell Maggie everything you’ve ever said about her.”

Craig smiled then pulled over a chair and sat down at Davy’s desk. “Like I said, I’m surprised you didn’t draw lots after New Year. Now go away, Nicky. Davy and I have work to do.”

Craig turned towards Davy, knowing that Nicky was returning to her desk drawing a finger across her throat for Davy to see.

“You’ve got the books from Des, and I know you’ve been looking at the mode of death.” He gave him a hopeful smile. “Anything so far?”

“Not on the knife yet, chief, I’m waiting for Dr W…Winter’s post-mortem report. But the M.O. was easy to check. There’s nothing similar anywhere in the Americas or Western Europe, I’m still waiting for the reports from further afield. I’m s…sure I read about a similar death in a journal years ago, but I can’t remember where.”