by Eoghan Egan
‘Perhaps your ghost can reassemble all the bits and send a text from Nirvana.’
Must get rid of my pay-as-you-go phone.
00:09.
‘It’s Monday, Ciara. You’ll be home shortly.’
Styne indicated left and turned in the pot-holed by-road. Ciara moaned and got Tasered again. He opened a window to dispel the odour of burned flesh and steered up the farmhouse driveway. Halfway in, it divided. The right-angled split gave access to the front, the left led to the rear. He steered left and parked near the back door. ‘Welcome.’
The belt buckle had twisted under Ciara. When he got it open, Styne caught the unconscious woman underarm, pulled her across the kitchen and along the tiled hallway. A T-Strap high heel screeched in protest, gouging a furrow in the laminated wood floor.
Styne stopped.
Where’s her other shoe? Must have fallen off in the boot.
He hauled Ciara inside the windowless room.
-----
Malcolm’s fingers tapped the keyboard symbols.
Ciara had kept her promise. This money would change his losing streak. Crystal Gaze at Fakenham was a dead cert. He studied the other horses and riders in the 17:20 at Wolverhampton. Early Riser, the 20/1 shot caused him to hesitate; definitely an improver, but his eyes kept returning to Hobson’s Choice. Trained by Gary Lyndon, and the jockey was Tommy Doyle from County Leitrim. Good omen, Malcolm thought. 16/1. It would work out. It had to.
He placed his bets, pressed “send,” and Ciara’s four thousand euro transferred electronically to a bookie’s bank account.
-----
Styne dumped Ciara on the rug.
He turned the dimmer switch high, dragged the chair closer, and contemplated her features; a scientist studying a specimen in a Petri-dish. Her skin was pale as a moonbeam, breath ragged, arm muscles twitching.
‘Wakey, wakey.’ Styne slapped Ciara’s face. ‘I want to study your reaction, the moment of despair when you realised all’s lost. How gratifying it will be to hear you beg.’
I’ll dangle a literal lifeline, several, in fact, before yanking them out of her reach.
Styne rearranged her hair. His eyes drifted downwards. A necklace of freckles spread around Ciara’s neck, her arms a blanket of stippled flesh. He leaned closer, inhaled her scent. Dropped to his knees and nipped her jaw. Waited for a reaction.
Nothing.
He burrowed his head in Ciara’s neck, hand closing around a breast. Pinched a nipple as he slathered a snail trail of saliva from her chin to ear. His lips locked on an earlobe, right hand tracing a path along Ciara’s stomach, down her leg, avoided the crusted blood that congealed on the wound below her knee. He watched her face for any change in expression, as his fingers slithered under the skirt, along the inside of a thigh, groping their way higher.
No response.
‘I’ll tie you up in a minute. First, let’s have fun.’ Styne’s left thumb prised open Ciara’s jaws, and he forced his tongue in.
Ciara stirred. Drool dribbled from her mouth.
‘Wake up, bitch. I’ve begun without you.’
He sucked on Ciara’s tongue, explored molars, bit her inner lip, while the right hand continued to worm. Fingertips touched cotton. Pulled it aside.
Wet.
‘You’ve started too.’ Styne shoved his tongue deeper into her mouth.
Ciara choked, swallowed, and her teeth clamped vice-like around the intrusion.
A sliver of pain jetted along Styne’s trigeminal nerve. He rolled away, the high-pitched squeal similar to a stuck pig. His mouth was on fire, full of red-hot embers. Teeth spun in their sockets, and flames lapped at his facial nerve ends. He gobbed, showering Ciara with saliva and blood clots. Noticed his fingers, and Styne’s lips curled in disgust.
Bitch. Bitch. Filthy bitch.
He used the rug to wipe off menstrual blood.
Ciara groaned.
Incensed, Styne grabbed the immobiliser and rammed it into her neck, dumping its power into her nervous system. Ciara juddered, a puppet on a string, as the continuous high-volt, low-amp electrical charge ripped through her, hijacking and scrambling neurological impulses, depleting energy reserves, and converting blood sugar to lactic acid. Styne’s blood, sweat and sputum sprayed Ciara’s neck, acting as a conduit. Her body jerked, shook and spasmed. He watched the convulsions, and kept the stun gun against her skin until it ran out of charge.
Ciara’s sightless eyes gazed up at him.
Styne hawked and spat on the body. In the downstairs bathroom, he searched presses for analgesics, but could only find a bottle of mouthwash. He inspected his tongue in the small mirror over the washbasin. It was split, swollen, bleeding, and it throbbed in torrents of piercing pain. He swigged the liquid, closed his eyes against the burn, gargled, spat, swilled again, scrubbed his hands, inspecting each fingernail, then cleaned them a second time.
Foul bitch. Mucky, scruffy, filthy whore. Must find the shoe.
Styne searched the Mazda boot, the dim bulb forcing him to scrabble around.
Where is it?
He pulled out the silage cover, explored each corner, and rooted under the front seats.
Nothing.
His fingers found Ciara’s laptop. He opened the lid, pressed the “off” button and watched the screen blink, flare and die. Still rattled, he combed the area between car and house. Repeated the process in reverse, ignoring the pounding pain.
Must have slipped off when I moved the bitch into the front seat.
He tried to imagine the consequences, weighed up his options.
Was it worth a return trip?
No.
Did I leave anything behind that could incriminate me?
No.
Did anyone see me?
No.
Does the shoe matter?
No.
What did I handle or take that could convict me?
Only the bitch, but she’s easy to get rid of.
Styne turned on the immersion heater, then used the plastic wrap to cover Ciara’s body, holding his face away from the smell of fresh urine. He carted the corpse out, jammed it into the boot, banged the lid and stood thinking.
Her clothes. My blood is on them.
He hunted in a cupboard underneath the kitchen sink, found scissors and a five-litre container of liquid sodium hydroxide. He shook it. More than half-full.
The cattle, settled for the night, rushed forward and stuck their heads between feed bars.
Styne started the Hitachi and operated levers. He cocked his head, listened harder.
What’s that noise? Bearings rubbing together. Not as smooth as they should be. Sounds clunky.
In the silage shed, he positioned the bucket underneath a bale and scooped. The engine strained, whining in protest, and refused to hoist the wrapped feed. He pushed and pulled the joysticks, willing the mechanical arm to lift, but the machine didn’t respond.
Too heavy. Not enough pressure. Pinched tube. Oil leak. No midnight snack for cattle tonight.
He made a mental note:
Phone mechanic.
Styne threw the oven cleaner drum into the cab, guided the machine across the farmyard, halted beside the Mazda and manhandled Ciara’s body into the loading bucket. Then he inched the digger into a field. Near a corner, Styne juggled pedals and controls. A boom arm arched and Ciara’s corpse tumbled into a snowbank. The mud bucket blade sliced into soil, curled and lifted, the digger swivelled on its turntable with the grace of a ballet dancer and dumped its load. Styne jockeyed the bucket into the grave for another measure of clay. The engine revved and whined, hydraulic tubes hissed, striving to lift and complete the action. Failed.
Won’t be able to bury you any deeper.
‘Wide and shallow. Same as yourself, Miss McGuire.’
Styne jumped from the cab, unrolled Ciara’s body and used the scissors to shear her clothes. Then he rolled her face up into the shallow grave. He twisted open the oven cleaner lid, upende
d the container and let the sodium hydroxide glug onto Ciara’s body and face.
‘Bye, Ciara, you bitch.’
He threw the empty container into the cab and bundled up the clothes and silage wrap. Then he backfilled the grave and compacted the clay into a neat mound.
The next snow shower will cover it. Once the machine’s repaired, I’ll flatten the earth out.
The Hitachi clanked its way back, passed by the sheds. At the roadside gateway, he powered off the engine, locked up the digger …
The grease monkey can work on it here.
… then walked back to the shed and scrubbed the paint from the Mazda’s number plates.
At the farmhouse, Styne checked his iPhone. No missed calls. He chucked the laptop into a large refuse sack, stripped and added his clothes, work boots and Ciara’s shoe to the junk. Upstairs, under the shower, the tepid water didn’t relieve his headache. The night hadn’t played out as he’d envisaged. The magic never happened. He stumbled to his old bedroom and lay in the darkness. His raw, inflamed tongue kept clicking against teeth, causing nerve endings to vibrate in pain.
Bitch died too quick. Should’ve suffered more, after the stress she caused me.
He wrestled with the pillow, couldn’t find a soft spot. Jagged thoughts crisscrossed his mind. The lost shoe bothered him. He hated to leave traces.
I should go search for it. Did I leave any evidence in her house? Lime. I ought to have marinated her in lime. To make sure. Should’ve burned the body. Fire destroys DNA. Dammit. Damn her. Damn them all. My mouth. Have to cancel next week’s appointments.
Adam Styne writhed and twisted.
03:47.
Propelled by pain, he dressed and used bathroom bleach and out of date Vanish Oxi Action to remove traces of Ciara McGuire from the farmhouse. Every crack and crevice got scoured – he’d learned of the unlikely places body secretions ended up from the scrubbing spree needed after Isobel Stewart. He rolled up the stained mat, scrubbed and vacuumed the Mazda twice, tipped the hoover contents into the refuse sack, shoved the rug on top, and chucked the bag in the car boot. He drove out, stopped at the digger, collected Ciara’s clothes, the old silage cover and oven cleaner container and added them to the rubbish.
In Birr town centre, Styne offloaded some of the rubbish in an industrial bin. On the Roscrea road, he came upon a builder’s skip, near full with debris, and rammed the mat, Ciara’s shoe and a pile of clothes into a corner. In a housing estate, he split and divided the remainder between several residential bins. He then dismantled his pay-as-you-go phone and used a jagged piece of masonry to mince the pieces into unrecognisable bits of plastic, discarding them at intervals on the drive home. The laptop got hurled into a stream. At the farmhouse, he vacuumed the garage car again.
Get rid of hoover tomorrow.
The headache, an octopus around his brain, squeezed tight, turning his world into a red and black blur, demanding a release.
Three hours rest, then I’ll go to Tullamore Court Hotel. Need to get noticed.
Styne couldn’t sleep.
Dark dreams and adrenaline kept him awake; dissatisfied, frustrated, unfulfilled.
Chapter 8
Monday, 14 January
4:45 a.m.
Jana Trofimiack pulled two suitcases, nudged Lech ahead into Belfast International airport terminal and studied the flight information display. The flight was on time. An automated voice barked unintelligibly. To her right, a train of people waiting to get through security, tail-backed down the escalator and into the arrival’s hall. On her left, another line of travellers queued for bag drop. Lech yawned and rubbed his eyes. A man and two women brushed by. Jana looked around for her contact, saw no one she recognised, and joined the line. She checked the passports and tapped the icon on her mobile where she’d saved their boarding passes. If the contact doesn’t get here before we go through security, I’m not waiting, Jana thought. I’ll sell the Yeats painting, and Tomasz can keep the money he owes me. She listened to the low hum of conversations around her. An electronic ping-pong over the loudspeakers preceded a flight departure announcement. The trio that had hurried by, were now directly ahead.
A finger tapped her shoulder.
Jana turned.
‘Tomasz sent me.’ A man unzipped a rucksack, took out an envelope and handed it to her. ‘For you. You have something for me?’
Jana bent to open a suitcase, and with no drama and minimum fuss, Jana, Lech and the contact got hemmed in and removed from the line.
‘Police.’ A woman, one of the trio, caught Jana’s arm. ‘I’m arresting you on suspicion of art fraud, theft, conspiracy to commit crimes, extortion, money laundering and involvement in running a criminal organisation.’
‘What?’
‘Do you understand?’
‘Co? I—Lech?’
Lech, half asleep, barely realised that the second female officer separated him from his mother.
‘Lech!’ Jana was screaming now. ‘Let go. Let me go. Let him go. Where are you taking my son?’ She wrenched her arm away. ‘What are you doing with Lech?’
‘Don’t resist, Ms Trofimiack. You’re surrounded by police.’ The female officer snapped a handcuff around Jana’s wrist. ‘I’m taking you to a police station for questioning. We’ll take care of your son. Now, please step with me towards the door.’
Jana’s dreams of a new life nose-dived when she saw the confusion and fear in Lech’s eyes. She wanted to reach out, tell him everything was okay, but handcuffed, she’d no choice but comply with the officer’s request.
Morning
Hugh spent the night painting.
Once he’d completed the kitchen, it made the hallway seem anaemic, so he tackled that. Then, the upstairs landing. Outside, the fog lifted and shadowy rays of diluted sunshine picked their way across the walls.
He rambled outdoors and let the crisp air flush paint fumes from his lungs. Kathleen’s demands had a cathartic effect; the monotonous brush strokes helped ease internal turmoil. Mothers must have an intuitive perception when their offspring’s conflicted, he thought, and what’s necessary to begin the healing process.
Robins and chaffinches sang a strident disharmony of whistles and tweets, in their celebration of a new day. Except for a single cirrus cloud that scarred the sky, the world was pristine. After sprinkling breadcrumbs on bird tables, Hugh showered and vowed to tidy up his own home later. No point in delaying the inevitable; staying mired in the past wasn’t helping his mentality. He needed to remove Eilish’s presence from the house.
‘Why aren’t you at work, Hugh?’
‘You keep asking me that, Ma. I came to see you first.’
‘I’m ashamed to have given everybody so much trouble.’ Kathleen frowned. ‘Why’re you mooching around like a broody hen?’
‘I want to spend a while with you.’
‘Leave. Go home to Eilish.’
‘Hmm?’
‘Eilish hasn’t visited in ages.’
‘We’ve parted ways, Ma.’
‘Oh? I need to get out of here. Take me to the hostel. Nobody should be without food on Christmas day.’
‘Doctor hasn’t given permission yet, Ma. He’ll call around later. Don’t worry about the hostel. Amy and the other volunteers will make sure everyone’s fed.’
‘Christmas day is always hectic. They’ll—’
‘It’s not Christmas day, Ma. Christmas was weeks ago. Today is January fourteenth.’
‘What?’ Kathleen gaped at Hugh.
‘Yep. Christmas is done and dusted for another year.’
Kathleen cried.
‘Ma? What’s the matter?’ Hugh sat on the bed and hugged her. ‘Ma?’
‘Get away from me. You left me here, locked up, and those souls starving on the streets? I hate you.’
‘No one’s hungry, Ma.’
‘I don’t believe you anymore. You’ve kept me here throughout Christmas. Never visited once. Leave. I want to die in peace.’
‘I’m staying.’ Hugh used a tissue to dry his mother’s tears.
‘Go. How’s Eilish? I haven’t talked to her since Christmas.’
‘See? Now you remember being with us for Christmas.’
‘Course I do. What’s the matter with you?’
‘Nothing, Ma.’
Hugh’s mobile buzzed. Sharona Waters. ‘Top o’ the morning from Glenavy. Quick call. You said to keep in touch, but I haven’t had a chance ’til now. Yesterday was mental, and already today the poo has hit the fan. I’ve only got a sec, so here’s the lowdown: Two detectives from the art and antiques fraud squad are here with Dorothy. They’ve arrested Hattinger’s manager, Jana Trofimiack, at Belfast International, on her way to Poland. Caught her passing another painting to an accomplice. Jack B. Yeats this time; that’s the artist, not the accomplice.’
‘I’ve heard of him.’
‘They charged her with theft and forgery. Story’s gonna hit the headlines over the next few hours.’
‘So it’s confirmed. This person swapped fakes for genuine articles?’
‘Yep.’
‘Jesus, when this breaks, art appraisers will be in demand.’
‘Depends,’ Sharona said. ‘Anyhow, Dorothy’s going for the jugular. She wants to push this into the public domain as a warning to other collectors. An hour ago, reporters and TV crews arrived in convoy and set up Lowel Pro Lighting Kits and Sony camcorders. And before you ask, no, I haven’t a clue either. I’m just reading off the equipment boxes. There’s a guy beside me with a boompole—’
‘A what?’
‘Boompole. A microphone with a furry thingy on the end.’
‘Oh, yeah.’
‘Dorothy wants me involved. She’s telling everybody I’m a saint.’
‘Saint Sharona. Has a nice ring to it.’
‘First foray in front of the media.’
‘You’ll adapt.’
‘Crikey, I’m jumpy as a spring lamb. Any advice?’
‘Enjoy the attention. Let me know how you get on. Oh, don’t wear white …’
Kathleen dozed. Hugh dialled Ferdia and filled him in on Sharona’s news. David chattered and sang to himself in the background.
‘That’s the ripple effect,’ Ferdia said. ‘You drop a pebble in the middle of a pond, and the ripples shake up whatever’s in its path.’
