Struggles of Psycho

by Rhyam O'Bryam

  ‘Poor Ivy. Superintendent, I must go. I need to order a taxi at once.’

  ‘Of course, good luck.’

  ‘And, Superintendent,’ there was a sob in her voice. ‘Thank you, so, so much. Words can’t manage—’

  ‘You’re welcome, Mrs Patterson. Goodbye.’

  After another round of thanks, Mrs Patterson hung up. McCarthy was grinning at me. ‘Makes the job worthwhile, doesn’t it?’

  I couldn’t help but smile back. Not many missing persons cases ended well. It was a rare pleasure to be able to make someone so happy.

  Once in the car, I glanced at the dashboard. It was still only seven. There was time to confront Philips.

  ‘Call the station, ask them to put Philips in an interview room.’

  ‘I was hoping you’d say that,’ said McCarthy with relish.

  There was no hurry now. In fact, there was no harm in Philips having to wait a while in the room, wondering what we had found. As we arrived at the station I noticed that once again my car spot was taken. This time I didn’t care.

  ‘Want to hop out, while I go down to the hotel?’ I offered.

  ‘No, it’s fine. And the walk will do me good.’

  Was McCarthy being sarcastic? It didn’t seem so from the look she gave me.

  As we strode up the hill to the station, McCarthy reached out and tugged my sleeve, near the elbow, bringing me to a stop. I looked towards her. ‘Before we go in, I just want to say, Doyle, that not many Supers would have gone for murder. You did good.’

  ‘Thanks, McCarthy. You too. If you hadn’t backed me all the way, I’d have wavered, no doubt about it.’

  ‘I knew she was a shit from the outset. I just knew it.’

  ‘Come on, let’s see what she has to say for herself now.’

  ‘Yeah. For the first time ever, I’m looking forward to seeing her.’

  When we entered the interview room, the atmosphere was completely different to the earlier encounters between us. Previously, Philips would be onto me like a hawk, her eyes drilled down into mine as soon as we were both in the room. This time she sat at the table, looking down. Despite the short notice, her lawyer was with her. Brian Healy had gone down in my estimation during these last two days. Obviously, Philips had some kind of hold over him.

  We took or seats and McCarthy read out the preliminaries before the recording started.

  ‘Superintendent, Detective Sergeant, my client has decided to avail herself of her right to remain silent. She won’t be answering any more questions.’

  ‘I see,’ I replied.

  For a few minutes we all just sat there, McCarthy happy to wait for me. Naturally, it was Philips I was interested in and I studied her face. With her cheeks being so heavy, there was always a tendency for her expression to be sullen. This was often mitigated by her animation and the feral intelligence in eyes that had fixed on me time and again, forcing me to look away, uncomfortable. Now, the sullenness was especially pronounced and it was her who quickly looked away whenever our eyes met.

  ‘You know, of course, what we found there.’ My statement drew a sharp wince from Philips, but she didn’t speak. ‘Aren’t you curious as to whether Ivy Patterson was alive or dead?’

  This time Philips stared at me, really stared. Obviously, she did want to know, she was scrutinising me for clues.

  ‘I’ll tell you, if you ask.’

  ‘All right then,’ Philips said at once. ‘Which was it?’

  Her lawyer turned sharply. ‘I thought we agreed—’

  ‘Oh, fuck off, Healy. Well, Superintendent?’

  ‘She’s alive.’

  By way of response, Philips sat up straight and extended her hands, excited. I would have said she was pleased, even delighted, if I were reading just her body language. But on her face was pain and the realisation all her lies were exposed. That she would be jailed for murder.

  ‘How is she?’ Again, a contradiction. A tenderness, despite the fact that Philips had wanted Ivy Patterson dead.

  ‘As well as can be expected for someone who came close to death by thirst. But she’s out of danger.’ I made sure Philips understood it was all over. I’ve seen people cling to impossible lies, despite overwhelming evidence against them. It was better if they caved in and saw the truth. That they were caught.

  ‘How do I know that? Are you trying to trick me for some reason, Superintendent?’ For a moment, Philips had her old, cunning expression back.

  I just laughed. ‘Well, you just have to look at McCarthy here, would she be so obviously cheerful if Ivy Patterson were dead and unable to testify against you?’

  By way of backing me up, McCarthy gave Philips a smile and a knowing turn of her head, almost a wink. Of course, we could have been acting, could have planned this routine, but I could see that Philips knew I was telling the truth. Quite apart from an air of smug confidence that poured from McCarthy – and probably from me – Philips had probably done the calculations. Less than three days had passed since Ivy had been walled into that little chamber. Despite all of her efforts to string us along, Philips hadn’t kept us away from the castle for that crucial extra day or two.

  Now, her face looked beaten. Tired. And all that alert intelligence that had mocked us in the past had gone from her expression.

  ‘It’s over. You’re going to prison for a long time. The best thing you can do now is tell us what really happened. If you co-operate and plead guilty, you won’t get the maximum sentence.’ I saw her wince as I said the word prison.

  Philips paused before responding. ‘Let me speak to Ivy and I’ll give you what you want.’

  ‘You’re in no position to bargain,’ replied McCarthy immediately and forcefully.

  ‘No.’ I added.

  Philips folded her arms. ‘Then we’re done.’

  I was disappointed: the moment where she might have broken down and confessed had passed. There was no way I was going to allow Philips to see Ivy Patterson. While it had been clear that Ivy was raging against Philips and wanted to testify against her, there could be something in their relationship that could yet come into play and turn things around. Why had Ivy stayed so long with Philips? Could there be a hidden hook there, that Philips could still use?

  ‘Did you murder Michael Patterson with a knitting needle, while he was tied to a wooden frame?’ I asked her.

  Philips said nothing, only shook her head.

  ‘Did you kidnap Ivy Patterson and imprison her in the wall of your castle with intent to murder her?’

  Again, nothing.

  ‘Very well. But while you sit in your cell tonight, think about this. If you try to deny these charges, you’ll cause a lot of stress and pain to Ivy Patterson. If you want to start making amends to her, you won’t fight us.’

  It was an odd thing to say to someone who had tried to murder Ivy but I sensed that Philips was conflicted. That some part of her wanted Ivy to be – well, not happy, Philips had no empathy for others – to be in her life still. I hoped that Philips would think about her life as a prisoner and how she might write letters to Ivy. That confession and a guilty plea might be the start of a new relationship between them.

  With Philips remaining silent, there was nothing more to say. So McCarthy and I stood up and left the room. Outside the station, the wind blowing her blonde curls around her forehead, McCarthy grinned up at me. ‘Fancy a celebratory drink?’

  ‘Can’t, I’m driving.’ I saw her smile fade. ‘But tell you what, let’s go for something to eat. Indian maybe?’

  ‘Great.’

  We walked down the hill towards the town centre together. There was an election taking place and all the lampposts were covered with pictures of politicians.

  ‘You forget that the rest of the world carries on, when you’re involved in a case like this,’ I observed.

  McCarthy looked at me and then the posters. ‘Yeah, it doesn’t seem important. And anyway, it’s pretty much the same, whoever wins. There will still be murderers t
o catch.’

  I chuckled. ‘That’s almost profound, McCarthy.’

  ‘I can be profound. Don’t let the Dublin accent fool you.’

  That night, I had a troubled dream. In a plush, red theatre, McCarthy and I were sitting side by side watching the show and enjoying it. Then the next act was announced and my heart sank. It was the world-famous hypnotist, Amy Philips. On she came, in a glittering, deep blue outfit, picked out by the spotlight. Then, with almost no introduction, she walked to the front of the stage and smiled, opening her arms.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen. Right now, every one of you feels as though you are in control of your own minds. If you choose to raise your right hands, then you can do so. Yet the astonishing fact about the human brain is that it is susceptible to suggestion and we are not as in control of our actions as we believe.

  ‘What we are going to see tonight, I hope will – raise your right hands please – will astonish you and also amuse you.’

  About half the audience had their right hands in the air. Neither McCarthy and I had stirred. My partner gave me a worried look.

  ‘Let’s begin. You may lower your hands.’ There was a ripple of surprise and a few claps. Evidently some people hadn’t noticed they had put their hands up. ‘I’d like a volunteer.’

  Like a spider creeping up on its prey, Amy Philips walked slowly along the front of the stage until she stopped before a woman in a white dress. ‘You, please. A round of applause please, for our first volunteer.’

  Hesitantly, the woman stood up. It was Ivy Patterson. I felt like standing up and shouting, or even running down to the front and forcibly detaining her. But I found that I could not move. I did nothing as Ivy came up the side stairs and onto the stage, where a spotlight picked her out. A fragile moth, all of a flutter.

  Amy Philips gestured towards the wings and a simple wooden chair was brought in. After Ivy was seated, Amy bent down to look her closely in the eyes. For a minute or two, a whispered conversation took place, but the audience was interested and did not become restless.

  ‘We are ready!’ Amy suddenly exclaimed, turning back to the audience. ‘Please stand beside me.’

  Ivy got up and walked to Amy, who held her hand. ‘Now, tell Superintendent Doyle that I’m innocent.’

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  At two in the afternoon, shortly after I’d sent the updated file to the DPP, I got a call from her.

  ‘Doyle, well done, can you come up to Dublin this afternoon?’

  ‘I’ll start right away.’

  ‘Thank you. And can you bring McCarthy too?’

  ‘She’s with forensics.’

  ‘Never mind then. See you in about two hours?’

  On the car journey, I mused over how Helen O’Reilly would respond to the file. She’d said, “Well done”, but that probably only referred to the rescue of Ivy Patterson. No doubt the DPP would see that there was a weakness on our side. Unfortunately, forensics couldn’t clinch the case for us. The wheelbarrow had been drenched in bleach. There was no blood on the floor of the castle. There was no sign of the X-frame that Mike was tied onto.

  In short, Philips had done a thorough tidy up after the murder, which left us with a somewhat unsatisfactory case of Ivy’s word against Philips. And after my nightmare, I wasn’t entirely sure of how Ivy would behave on the stand. If Ivy stuck to her story, I was confident the jury would believe her. We had hours of tapes of Amy Philips saying the most disturbing things. But my worry was that we might not even get a kidnapping charge to stick, if Ivy suddenly changed her story to say that this was all part of some weird BDSM game.

  The only corroborative evidence I’d gained in the last day was a confirmation that Michael Patterson’s body had faint abrasions on the wrists and ankles, but the pathologist had not been able to date them. They could have been up to a week old.

  Dublin traffic was slow, as always, but I came in along the bus lanes and made good time to the DPP’s offices. Theirs was a building with a lot of dark glass at the front, which allowed me to check my appearance as I strode up the stairs to the entrance. Grey-haired, dark-suited and, I would say, good-looking, even allowing for bias.

  I was shown in right away and O’Reilly came around from her desk to shake my hand before ushering me to the seat in front of her desk. My file was on the top of the pile and she took it up, to flick through it.

  ‘This is excellent police work, Doyle. I was right to trust in your experience. You remember when you came in here with no clear evidence for a murder charge?’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘If I hadn’t known you better, I’d have said the best you could deliver was manslaughter. And even that wasn’t clear. The self-defence argument was very strong. Your intuition was that Amy Philips was a cold-blooded murder, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘And wow, you were on the money!’ The DPP slapped the file down triumphantly. ‘The media are going to be all over this you know. This is going to be your fifteen minutes of fame. Sex, murder, a race against time to discover a beautiful woman walled up in a castle and dying of thirst. It’s sensational. You’ve had media training, of course?’

  ‘It’s a while ago, but I remember it well. Draw up a statement with the guidance of our PR team and stick to it. No digressions.’

  ‘Exactly. I’ll pass your number on to them and you can expect a call.’ She smiled at me. ‘Now, to close the case. Can you get a confession?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  The smile disappeared.

  I gave what I hoped was a wry shrug. ‘Philips is holding out for a meeting with Ivy Patterson. She says if she gets that, she’ll give us what we want.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And I said “no”. So she clammed up.’

  There was a pause. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Well, I think the whole case could be in danger if Philips somehow managed to get to Ivy Patterson. Suppose Ivy suddenly retracted her statement. Even the kidnapping charge might not stick if Ivy said it was a game they were playing, being imprisoned in the wall.’

  The DPP shook her head. ‘But Ivy’s not going to retract, is she? She’s not going to forgive someone for trying to murder her. And what a way to go. I mean, thirst. Jesus, that’s painful.’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘I think you should allow the meeting. Obviously behind a glass wall,’ she saw the look in my eyes, ‘or a partition if you don’t have one in Wexford. I’ll tell you why I think this, Doyle. Firstly, it might get the guilty plea we need to wrap this up. But secondly, if you’ve got doubts about Ivy, best to test them this way than in court. If she comes through fine, then you know she’ll manage the courtroom.’

  I didn’t answer. It wasn’t that I disagreed, I was genuinely turning this over in my mind. What the DPP said made sense and yet I did not like the prospect of a meeting between Amy Philips and Ivy Patterson.

  ‘What are you thinking, Doyle?’

  ‘I’m trying to put my finger on the question of why, given your idea sounds like a good one, I don’t like it.’

  ‘And?’

  I let out a sigh. ‘It’s because I can’t quite see who these two woman are. There’s a darkness, something impenetrable, going on. What I mean is that most murder cases are easy to understand. The killer is a brute, perhaps, with a terrible temper. Or is so filled with hate and greed, they are prepared to kill or arrange the killing. A couple of times I met men who thought they were above the law, who didn’t seriously consider they’d get caught.

  ‘Amy Philips is a bit like those examples, except that she knew from the beginning she’d go to trial. Her plan has been to escape a long sentence with a self-defence case. And I really don’t understand why she would kill Michael Patterson. To be cruel to Ivy? That’s the reason Ivy gives. My impression of Amy Philips is she doesn’t care enough about Ivy to risk the consequences of murder. Deep down, she doesn’t care about anyone at all.

  ‘And then there’s Ivy. Why did Ivy sta
y with Philips all these years? Can it really have been blackmail? They were in a sexual relationship. Perhaps Ivy wasn’t as opposed to this as she signalled, both to Philips and in her account to us. Perhaps, in a twisted way, Ivy wanted to submit to Philips? I don’t know; I don’t understand and that makes me uneasy.

  ‘And also if Philips was able to blackmail Ivy into staying at the farm, then what if Philips can wield the same threat to stop her testifying?’

  The DPP brushed back her blonde fringe, as if a strand of that immaculate haircut had obstructed her vision and looked at me for a while, appraisingly. ‘If you go into court and you don’t know how Ivy Patterson will behave, you’ll run a greater risk than bringing them together now.’

  ‘All right then.’ What else could I do? Hold out against the DPP on a feeling? All the same, as I left, I regretted having agreed to the idea.

  When I had asked Ivy Patterson to meet with Amy Philips in Wexford police station, I had strongly hoped that she would say no. Then, with a clean conscience, I could say I had tried my best. But instead, she had agreed. So less than twenty-four hours after I’d sat in the DPP’s office, Ivy was in a waiting room with her mother, while two sergeants escorted Philips from her cell to our one interview room that had a partition. It wasn’t ideal, because although the two sides of the room were separated by a wooden wall, the partition only extended from the walls to the sides of a table in the centre of the room. There was nothing to stop someone climbing over the table and attacking the person on the other side. Nothing but the two sergeants, McCarthy and me.

  For what it was worth, probably very little, I had made Philips repeat her promise to give us a full confession after she had met Ivy. Once Philips had sat down in the room on the far side of the partition, I took a seat at the table opposite her, so that she was just framed by the rectangle of the partition. This is how Ivy would see her.

  ‘You understand the situation?’ I said. ‘Any attempt to intimidate, blackmail or threaten Ivy Patterson by any means and we close down the interview.’

  Worryingly, Philips was back to her old self. She just smiled her knowing smile. Still feeling that this was a bad idea, I glanced back to McCarthy and nodded. Stony-faced, my partner left the room to fetch Ivy.