Gallows Lane (Inspector Devlin Mystery 2) (25 page)

The air beneath the bridge was cold and damp and smelt of decaying leaves. The river’s surface barely rippled in the breeze. The noise I made startled a heron which took to the air. I began to suspect that we had come the wrong way, then heard the splash and a shout from Dempsey. Looking up to my right, I saw McLaughlin, dressed in jeans and white T-shirt, having broken free from the tree line, wading across the water. To have crossed directly under the bridge would have brought him up at the PSNI checkpoint. For several hundred yards on either side of that path, the opposite bank was blocked by a wire fence. McLaughlin clearly intended to wade upstream until he reached the end of the fence.

Following his lead, I tucked my gun into my waistband, and jumped down into the water. I had to work against a fair undercurrent and my feet skittered on the slimy pebbles on the riverbed. I stayed as close to the edge as possible and made my way up towards McLaughlin. He himself was now halfway across, but would need to work upstream to get past the fence. His strides were big but slow, his muscles shifting against his straining T-shirt, his back massive and intimidating.

He turned at the sound of our splashing, and I heard Dempsey below me shouting at McLaughlin to stop, though this, if anything, served to make him lift his pace.

I moved towards the centre of the river now, my legs aching and my heart racing. Sweat stung my eyes and the taste of salt filled my mouth. ‘Jesus, don’t panic,’ I told myself, over and over.

McLaughlin had reached the other side and was trying desperately to find a gap in the fence, rather than keep going until its end. He pawed at the wire, glancing upwards continually, attempting to gauge its height, which I put at about fifteen feet. He was strong, but he was also heavy. Still, several times he attempted to jump up and grab hold of the wire, only to be forced back down into the water by his own weight.

I turned and saw Dempsey not far behind me and, beyond him, a number of PSNI officers wading through the water alongside the bank. Eventually one of us would reach McLaughlin and he knew it. His jumping became more frantic, and he snarled frenetically. His fear was palpable. Drawing nearer to him, I reached behind my back for my gun. As I did so, McLaughlin dipped his big hands into the water and pulled up a log dripping with mud. He tossed it from one hand to the other as if it were weightless. Then he lunged at me.

His aim was far wide, but I still had to shift quickly to avoid him. In doing so, I lost my balance on the rocks and fell. The world spun from me, all noise became dull and echoed. The river water tasted of mud, and something else. I fought to breathe but only pulled in more water. As I struggled to stand, I felt a blow on my back and I thought my spine had split. My vision splintered then corrected itself, my head thudded, my legs gave way beneath me. I tried to stand again; this time the log hit me in the ribs. I heard the snap, amplified through the water, though I was unsure if it came from my ribs or the wood. The blood in my mouth tasted of old pennies. My stomach turned and I vomited out into the water, over myself. I looked up at McLaughlin as he raised the log above his head. His thick biceps were taut, his chest muscles strained so tightly against the fabric of his T-shirt I was sure it would tear. His facial expression lacked any sign of humanity, yet his eyes seemed frozen in a narcotic gaze, as if he were deriving some sort of sexual gratification from the violence of his actions. His face terrified me and I could think of nothing. I swung a punch in low, under his ribs, the impact registering no more than a dull thud. If McLaughlin bent slightly, that was the total extent of his reaction, though my fist throbbed with the punch. His eyes flashed in fury and he opened his mouth in a snarl as he prepared to bring the full force of the log on top of me.

Then I heard muffled shouting, followed by a single, hollow crack.

McLaughlin stopped and looked down at his chest, where red petals of blood were flowering beneath his right shoulder. He looked at the widening stain in bewilderment, dropping the log in the water. His thick hand pawed at the wound once, then his eyes rolled and he fell backwards into the river, making no attempt to break his own fall.

Spitting out bile and river water, I turned to see Dempsey still standing in position, his pistol trained at McLaughlin’s now inert body, his face drawn and pale. Behind him, thrashing through the water, came a group of policemen, guns held aloft in the river’s heavy air. Their mouths opened and closed, and I knew they were speaking, but all I could hear was the rush of the river, and somewhere a heron’s mighty wings pounding majestically against the sky in time with the beat of my own heart.

The dawn broke with rain; a series of light summer showers that drenched everything in a mist, then cleared almost as quickly. Just as the streets dried another miasma drifted in and passed.

McLaughlin was in ICU in Letterkenny General. Dempsey’s shot had missed his heart, though his scapula was shattered and one of his lungs had been damaged. Surgeons had worked on him through the night, attempting to remove shrapnel fragments from his lung. He’d live all right, but it might be a while before we’d be able to talk to him properly; or, more correctly, before he’d be able to answer us properly.

I’d been given a once-over by a harried intern, then sent home just after midnight. Before leaving I had called in with Caroline to see how she was and to keep her up to date with the case. She was awake, watching a late-night chat-show on TV. She had spoken to her son Peter earlier; Debbie had brought him in a taxi to see her. She thanked me, and Debbie in particular, for watching him. She showed little interest in talk of work, asking only if we had found out who had placed the rag in my car. I told her I suspected McLaughlin might have been behind it and she looked at me for a second, as though deep in thought. Then she looked past my head at the TV in the corner.

‘I’m sorry, Caroline,’ I said. ‘It should have been me. I’m sorry it turned out like this.’

‘I know you are, sir,’ she said. She opened her mouth to continue, then seemed to think better of it and closed her mouth again.

‘What?’ I said, sitting beside her on the bed.

‘Nothing.’

‘Come on, Caroline. What’s up?’

‘I’ve been thinking. If I’d been killed, what would have happened to Peter?’

‘Peter would be looked after, Caroline, ‘I said. ‘Besides, you weren’t killed. You can’t think that way.’

‘But I have to. I’m all he’s got. I . . . I hadn’t realized before how selfish I’m being – doing this.’

‘It’s not selfish, Caroline. It’s your job. You’d never stick at police work if you thought like that.’

‘I’m not sure I want to,’ she stated. ‘Be a Guard any more, I mean.’

‘You’re spooked, Caroline, is all,’ I said, though I suspected it was not that simple.

She shook her head as vehemently as she could, wincing at the effort. ‘I can’t get Hendry’s comment out of my head, sir, you know? That thing he said about kiddie fiddlers.’

‘He didn’t mean any—’ I started, but she interrupted.

‘I know, he didn’t mean anything. That’s not the point. I realized that I’d have said the same –
have
said worse, in fact. Like it’s all a big joke. I don’t know. I just don’t want to become so, so
inured
to it all that I forget that it’s not okay.’

‘You won’t, Caroline. You’re not the type. I mean, Jesus, look at me,’ I added, laughing.

‘I am looking at you. How many beatings are you going to take? What would happen to Debbie? Or Penny or Shane?’

Her comment hit a nerve, though I struggled not to show it. ‘I just don’t think about it, Caroline,’ I bluffed.

‘This coming from someone on drugs for panic attacks. Where do you think those have come from?’

I looked at her, opening my mouth to speak, but I could think of no adequate response.

‘Don’t take this the wrong way, but I look at you, sir, and I don’t want to be like you any more. I don’t want to die for people who don’t really give a shit. Peter means too much to me.’ She began to cry then, tears sliding silently down her cheeks. I moved up the bed and held her against me as her crying intensified and she let go of all that had happened to her, her sobs vibrating through my body. And I felt her sadness myself. And I remembered, yet again, Debbie’s warning about making martyrs of my family just to break a case.

The first time I thought I was going to die, really die, I’d wept as I thought of my family: my son’s face, my daughter’s laugh, my wife. Now, as I sat in shame, it dawned on me that this evening, as I had faced death once again, I had scarcely flinched.

I slept uneasily that night. Several times in my dreams I saw McLaughlin as if from above, thrashing at the water beneath him with a log till it turned red and a faceless body floated to the surface.

In the morning I phoned the station and told them I would be late. I took breakfast with Debbie and the kids, and we went and visited my parents. Afterwards, I collected up all the notes and scraps of paper I had gathered about the case in my study at home, and put them in the boot of the squad car I had commandeered. I worked until I had removed every shred of police work from my house.

By mid-afternoon, I’d reached Letterkenny General, bringing Peter with me. He went in to see his mum while I went to Daniel McLaughlin’s room, where Dempsey, Deegan and Meaney were all gathered.

‘What are you doing here?’ Dempsey asked. ‘Your boss seemed to think you’d be off for a while, asked us to take over questioning.’ He looked at the mass on the bed. ‘Not that’s there’s been much conversation, really.’

McLaughlin had yet to regain consciousness. He was connected to several machines beeping in steady rhythm, tubes in his nose and wires attached to his fingers. His chest rose and fell slowly. He was a short man, but made up for it in sheer mass. His shoulder muscles looked swollen, tensed, despite the fact that he was asleep. His arms were thick and toned; the left bearing a large tattoo of Cuchulain, leaning in death against a barren tree, a crow on his shoulder, waiting.

‘Anything?’ I asked, aware of the fact I was whispering slightly.

‘Sent off for toxicology. Took a DNA sample as well. See if it matches with any other sex offences. It’s hard to believe this guy just started recently – we’ll probably trace back a load of stuff on him.’

‘What about the toxicology?’

‘Steroids, apparently. And that breast drug you’ve been chasing down. And various other things, too, including traces of Viagra. A walking medicine cabinet, all things considered. Forensics turned up your date-rape chemical too: GBL? Seems it’s used in industrial solvents, paint remover and the like.’

I nodded. ‘I know.’

‘Well, it’s also used in alloy wheel cleaner. His garage was coming down with the stuff. He’ll be able to claim he needs it for his work, but it’s still something else to tie him to the girls. Plus forensics got a positive match with the fingerprints taken from the condom found near the Doherty girl. We’ve more than enough to wear him down. If the big bastard would ever wake up.’

We talked for a few moments, about Sinead Webb, who had been released, and then how the NBCI team had settled into Donegal (‘fine’), the changes in our relationship with the PSNI (‘promising’), and the quality of breakfast in the B&B where they were staying (‘terrible’).

Finally I told them I was heading back to the station. I asked Dempsey to get in touch with me if he heard anything, and promised to do likewise. A uniformed officer would be placed at McLaughlin’s door until he woke.

Dempsey walked down the corridor with me to see Caroline before we left.

‘I thought you and her were, you know, an item,’ he said.

‘Oh no,’ I said, ‘I’m married.’

‘I know,’ he said, smiling. ‘Just initial impressions, maybe. She’s a lovely girl.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Yes, I suppose she is.’

We walked in silence for a moment, neither of us really addressing the most important connection between us now.

‘Thank you, by the way. For last night. You saved my skin there, I reckon,’ I said.

‘Forget about it,’ Dempsey said, to cover his embarrassment. ‘That’s what us NBCI boyos do – swoop in and save the yokels!’

‘My hero,’ I joked.

‘You better believe it,’ he replied, winking.

*

On the way home, I stopped off at the station to get rid of the folders of notes from home. The place was as normal: Burgess still slouching at the front desk, a few uniforms making coffee and chatting at the back fire exit, where the smokers gathered. I don’t know what I had expected in my absence. Whatever it was, it had not happened.

Coming out of the office, I walked almost smack into Harry Patterson. He was dressed in his civvies, clearly only there to see Costello or drop something off.

We both tried to pass one another without speaking, but in the battle of manners which ensued, each moved in the same direction as the other.

‘How’s Caroline?’ Patterson finally asked, giving up on getting past me in silence.

I stared at him, wondering if his question was an implicit expression of guilt, or simple genuine interest.

‘She’s still in hospital,’ I said.

He nodded. ‘I’d heard.’

I moved past him.

‘About your nose,’ he said, nodding slightly at me. ‘I’m sorry.’

I stopped again, though was unable to turn and face him. I heard his steps as he came closer behind me.

‘I’m sorry. Costello told me you didn’t say anything. I just . . . you just, you were being a bit of a prick over the whole thing.’

His bluster long gone, I hardly recognized my colleague, nor could I wholly accept the sincerity of his apology.

‘Strange that my car gets sabotaged the same day, though, Harry. Funny coincidence.’

Patterson stepped towards me, a flash of his old personality shining through again. ‘Listen, Devlin,’ he said. ‘Don’t push your luck. I’m sorry for what happened to Caroline, but it had nothing to do with me, so don’t start spreading that shit now.’

I looked him square in the face for a second, then turned and walked away, uncertain what to say that could satisfactorily express the mess of thoughts and emotions I was feeling.