Down on Cyprus Avenue

by Paul Charles

  Wesley Whitlock, in residence at the Europa, was both happy and willing to treat the detectives to a late breakfast in his suite. “Would 11.30 a.m. be convenient?” A mere seven minutes later.

  “The Europa do a great Ulster Fry...” McCusker offered to the mobile-bound O’Carroll, “tell Barr to advise Mr Whitlock that 11.30 would be very convenient.”

  As it turned out, 11.30 wasn’t exactly convenient for Wesley Whitlock; upon their arrival at the Clinton Suite McCusker and O’Carroll were greeted by Kristin, one of Whitlock’s two PAs (or secretaries). Her boss was running late, she said, but would arrive presently. In the meantime they could order whatever they liked from the breakfast menu. McCusker plumped for his full Ulster Fry with great enthusiasm while O’Carroll, tutting under her breath, went for the continental option – an OJ, coffee, and croissants.

  The suite’s lounge was very large and very comfortably furnished. Whitlock’s PA’s were Amazonian: Kristin, a clear-skinned, black-bespectacled, long-haired blonde, and Bobby, a dark-skinned equally long-haired brunette. McCusker was convinced their identical white silk blouses would start popping buttons at the next breath and their grey skirts were so tight he silently suspected they’d have great trouble slipping out of them. He hoped O’Carroll wasn’t picking up on the direction his daydream was taking.

  Wesley Whitlock III and the room service trolley arrived at the same time. Without even acknowledging McCusker and O’Carroll, Whitlock Senior lifted the plate domes to inspect the food.

  “Ah, good Kristin – you told them how to prepare it,” he said in a rich baritone voice and then addressed his visitors, “I much preferred it when they had the Whip and Saddle dining area in the lobby. They knew how to prepare an Ulster Fry without any directions but now with the Causerie it’s all prepared buffet style – can’t abide it.”

  “This is McCusker and Detective Inspector Lily O’Carroll,” Bobby said by way of introductions.

  “Ah yes,” he said shaking McCusker’s hand enthusiastically, “Grafton Recruitment’s police officer, down from Portrush. I’ve heard all about you,” he continued, switching his attention to O’Carroll, “and you too miss.”

  Wesley Whitlock III was an imposing man, probably 6’2”, McCusker guessed. He wore a dark blue suit with a long overcoat of the same material and weight as a jacket. Bobby helped him to remove it, adding valet to her list of PA services in the process. He had a blue shirt with a white collar, a crimson Harvard University bow tie, and expensive-looking, gold, elasticised arm bracelets to ensure his cuffs remained the perfect length. His perfect snow-white teeth were too perfect, by about three decades, for his tanned features, longish snow-white hair and gold wire-rimmed glasses, which were strong enough to enlarge his big blue eyes. He was carrying a black rucksack which he flamboyantly swung off his shoulder in a well-practised movement, utilising both his right shoulder and hip. He quickly unzipped one of the pouches and extracted a white Apple iPad, which he proceeded to carry the way a fervent preacher carries a bible. He looked like a friendly old uncle, in the way Warren Buffett had perfected, yet he’d flash an occasional look that said, loud and clear, “mess with me and I’ll crush you in a heartbeat.” He pointed to the food, now proudly displayed on the large circular smoked glass table. “Come, come, won’t you join me for breakfast?”

  He sat down and pointed to a bottle on the trolley, nodding to Bobby: “Two fingers.” He turned his attention and gaze back to McCusker and proceeded to explain. “I’m seventy-seven years old – I’ve touched John Harvard’s shoe. I’ve a healthy appetite, I walk at least five miles a day and my only medicine is Jack Daniels. Will you join me?”

  A simultaneous “no” came back from the detectives.

  “Right answer guys,” he stated very quickly, while caressing the forefinger of his right hand continuously over the screen of his iPad. “So, how are you getting on with your investigation into my son’s death?”

  “Well sir,” McCusker began, noting that there was no interruption to drop the formalities, “we’ve just started to collect our information and we’re very happy of this opportunity to get some background on your son. You see your daughter Julia is very upset…”

  “Yes, yes,” he replied, tearing into his breakfast with all the gusto of a young wolf. He held his fork in his right hand as if it were a pen and he frequently used both his hands, complete with cutlery, to punctuate his conversation. “If I’d been able to do anything it would have been to spare her being the one to have found him. Who would do such a thing to another human?”

  “So you know the circumstances?” O’Carroll offered.

  The American looked at her in shock and for a split second McCusker sensed that Whitlock’s breakfast table was no place for a woman to speak.

  “Well, yes miss, Superintendent James Larkin has been kind enough to keep me up to speed. I wanted…”

  “Did you speak to your son often?” McCusker interrupted, as Bobby offered them all tea or coffee.

  “At least once a day.”

  McCusker was distracted enough by Bobby’s scent and proximity to miss Wesley Whitlock’s reply.

  “Sorry?” McCusker asked, shaking his head.

  “Yes, at least once a day. You see, as well as being his father I was also his mentor,” the old American offered by way of explanation.

  “Were youse in business together?” McCusker asked, trying to get a fix on this, in the knowledge that he hadn’t spoken to his own father for at least a couple of months now.

  “Well here’s the thing; I sent him over here to study and work so he’d get a broader worldwide experience for when he eventually came back to Boston to become a senior partner in the family firm. But I’d never factored in that he was going to fall in love with this place and want to settle here.”

  “So his move was permanent then?” O’Carroll asked and was rewarded with another of those ‘you’re only a wee girl, it’s fine to dine with us but please keep quiet,’ looks.

  “No, no, not at all. He didn’t have any roots over here, no serious girlfriends.” Whitlock stopped talking, placed his cutlery alongside his half-finished breakfast and wiped the corners of his mouth with his napkin in a manner very elegant for a man his size. He then downed half of his Jack Daniels, shaking his head aggressively to shortcut the alcohol into his bloodstream. “Let’s just say that Adam’s sowing-his-wild-oats stage was taking a lot longer than he’d figured. I think if I’m being candid, what he really needed was the love of a great woman. You know, someone to start a family with, produce some heirs for me, and create a reason for all of the other smelly stuff we call life.”

  McCusker immediately thought of O’Carroll’s sister Grace and he would have bet money the DI was sharing that thought at that exact moment.

  “We have a saying up on the northwest coast, sir,” McCusker started, “which is this: ‘Why aren’t the birds flying? The worms are all fat and juicy.’”

  “I get your point, McCusker,” Wesley replied, breaking into a gentler smile than the detective thought him capable of. “And you know, the answer to why the birds weren’t flying could be that there were so many fat and juicy worms around they didn’t need to bother; they could just glide down and pick and choose as often as they wanted.”

  “Meaning that Adam had too many women to pick from?” O’Carroll asked incredulously.

  “No dear, the worms and the birds are just metaphors,” Whitlock replied. “You see Adam, like the lazy birds, didn’t need to worry where his next meal came from. It was all there, the family fortune waiting for him and so, like the birds, he’d no motivation. He lost his mother about ten years ago; that hit us all pretty hard, but particularly Adam.”

  “Were you and your son very close?” O’Carroll asked, risking further Whitlock wrath.

  “Not really; I believe we were both duty-bound to each other. But equally I felt it was a phase he was going through and if we could just both hang in there and be civil to each other for the
next few years we would reap the rewards in our relationship down the line. As I say, DI O’Carroll, all he needed was the love of a good woman.”

  “But you stood by him, speaking to him every day?” O’Carroll persisted.

  “I’m afraid I’m a victim to my own impunity of character...” he offered, then suggested, “Why don’t we all take our tea or coffee and move over to the comfy chairs?” He led the way, carrying his iPad and the remainder of his Jack Daniels.

  No sooner had they done so when Bobby and Kristin reappeared from an adjoining room and in about 20 seconds flat had cleared away the dirty dishes onto a trolley and restored the table to its former flowered and magazined glory.

  When the girls returned from whence they came, Whitlock continued in a quieter voice, “You know, talking about my wife, she would never ever forgive me for allowing this to happen. I need the both of you to know that if it’s the last thing I do and if I need to spend my last cent doing so, I have…I need to find the person or persons who committed this ghastly crime and I need to ensure they receive their just punishment.”

  For the first time since they’d met, McCusker sensed this was Whitlock Senior suffering a weak moment, and it was probably as close as he would ever come to breaking down. “Were you aware of what his work entailed on a day-to-day basis?” he asked.

  “You know, run-of-the-mill conveyance stuff,” the American replied. “You’ve got to hand it to Adam – even in the middle of this recession he was still managing to keep his figures up to target in his department.”

  “Any difficult clients he would have reported to you?” McCusker continued, discreetly nodding at O’Carroll whom he hoped was picking up the signal to ask the next question.

  “No sir.”

  “Julia told us about the Cindy Scott incident,” O’Carroll started.

  “Okay, you know about that...good.”

  “She thought that Cindy’s brother Bing didn’t hold Adam responsible for the death of his sister.”

  “And nor was he – the inquest returned an accidental death,” Whitlock replied, immediately.

  “I know that, sir...” O’Carroll said slowly, “I was just wondering if Bing saw it the same way.”

  “Yes, yes fine boy,” Whitlock replied quickly. “I think he got over the incident a lot quicker than Adam did.”

  “Anyone else in Bing’s family have an opinion on the verdict?” McCusker asked.

  “You don’t mean to say you think Cindy’s death might be tied into the death of my son do you?” Whitlock said, as his finger furiously worked the iPad screen.

  McCusker took a large intake of breath, “Well, sir, at this stage we’re not in a position where we can rule anything or anyone out. Adam had few friends here, he didn’t have any money problems, from what we can gather from his friends he didn’t indulge in illegal drugs, on top of which there were no traces found on his premises. From what you say he seemed not to have made any enemies at work…”

  “He wasn’t politically active,” Whitlock offered.

  “It wasn’t a robbery-based crime,” McCusker continued. “The only thing we know...the only clue we have is that it was a violent attack. And it appeared well planned, in so far as the murderer didn’t leave a single clue or piece of evidence at the scene.”

  “Could it have been something which went wrong? You know, where something got out of hand and went horribly wrong?”

  “It’s much too violent for that…can I be candid with you?” McCusker asked mid-sentence.

  “Yes of course.”

  “We believe just one of the several blows to your son’s body would have been enough to render him unconscious.”

  Whitlock grimaced in pain, his face turning the colour of a wind-burnt leaf and for the first time since the beginning of the interview he looked every single one of his seventy-seven years on this planet.

  “Did, erm…” McCusker started hesitantly. “Did Adam ever discuss any of his girlfriends with you?”

  “I seem to remember there was someone back home he was serious about, but I never got to meet her or find out anything about her.”

  McCusker made a note to ask Julia about this as he asked, “What about in Belfast?”

  “Well there might have been something…”

  “Anything can be of help at this stage,” McCusker prompted.

  “Well, on more than one occasion when we were on the phone together he’d say he had to cut it short because he was off to see someone. I’d ask him if he was meeting up with Julia for dinner and he’d say no. Either that or I’d be speaking to Julia a few minutes later and I’d ask her if she was seeing Adam on that particular evening and she’d say no.”

  “And did you ask Julia who Adam was meeting up with?” O’Carroll asked, appearing a bit happier now that she was no longer drawing the Whitlock glare.

  “Well, sometimes discreetly. I didn’t want either of them to think I was being nosey,” Whitlock replied. He averted eye contact from both McCusker and O’Carroll before saying “I mean, I know my kids, I’ve got two healthy boys and one healthy girl; I can tell you that for a fact.”

  McCusker and O’Carroll looked confusedly at him.

  “You know, my boys like girls and my girl likes boys.”

  “Right, right, of course,” O’Carroll said, “and, ah, Julia had no idea who he was off to see on these particular evenings you’re referring to?”

  “None at all.”

  “When did you last speak to your son, sir?” McCusker asked.

  “Saturday evening, about three in the afternoon.”

  “Boston time or Belfast time?” O’Carroll asked.

  “Boston time, which with the time difference, would have been 8 p.m. Belfast time.”

  “Really?” McCusker said, a little thrown.

  “Yes. I know it was three because I’d just got back from a lunch at my club.”

  “And how was he?” McCusker asked, feeling his heart start to beat a little faster and the pulse in his temples grow more noticeable.

  “He sounded absolutely fine – good spirits, no hurry to get off the phone...”

  “What did youse talk about?”

  “You know, I was thinking about that on the flight over. My mind was racing away for the whole journey – I couldn’t catch a blink of sleep. If I’d have known it was going to be my last conversation with my son I’d have listened closer to his every intonation, I’d have cherished his every word. Let’s see now, we spoke about Julia, about my youngest son, about how he was getting on. I was asking Adam to look out for a job for Jaime, something in Belfast.”

  McCusker’s interest piqued. “Was your other son planning to come over as well?” he asked.

  “Look. In the interest of full disclosure...I’ll tell you everything, even some of our dirty linen, in the hope that it might help you, but also in the hope you’ll be discreet about it.”

  “Of course,” O’Carroll replied.

  Whitlock looked at McCusker who nodded positively.

  “Alright...My youngest son...he fell into the company of a bad woman, in that she did drugs. In point of fact, she is a judge’s daughter who has been cut off by her family entirely. I’m not quite sure, but I believe Jaime didn’t indulge too much, but at the same time I think he was taking…”

  “Are we talking about dope or coke?” O’Carroll asked.

  “Coke – Jaime was doing coke and I think she was taking heroin and methadone,” Whitlock admitted. “Anyway, I only found out about it when Jaime came back home one night a little worse for wear and eventually confessed to me he was on coke and Allison was on H and owed her dealer just over 30 grand.”

  “What did you do?” O’Carroll asked.

  “I struck a deal with him. I said I would pay the $30,000 off for her and give her another $20,000 to draw on, but only if he would agree to my two conditions, the first being that she had to get on a programme immediately and the second that he had to give her up. I knew it was cruel love
and I knew where it would end up. He agreed and I do believe he’s sticking to his side of the bargain, but I thought if Adam could just find something for Jaime over here, even just for six months, he’d either get her out of his system altogether or he’d meet a beautiful Irish Colleen and fall helplessly in love.”

  McCusker suspected that, this time, Grace was not the first person to spring into O’Carroll’s mind.

  “Did Adam know about Jaime’s problem?”

  “Ah no,” Whitlock Senior admitted, “I couldn’t...I didn’t want him judging his brother.”

  “Did Adam have any leads for Jaime in Belfast?”

  “He said he was still trying to find something interesting, but he didn’t really seem all that keen on Jaime coming over.”

  “Did Adam and Jaime get on well?” O’Carroll asked.

  “Yes, very well – always have been close. But Adam started to watch out for Jaime a lot more after their mother died.”

  “So why do you think he wasn’t keen for him to come to Belfast?” McCusker asked.

  “I think he didn’t want to have to put his brother up at his place. He knew that if he didn’t, Julia would have to. I said I didn’t mind getting him somewhere, or even putting him up in a hotel, but Adam said he couldn’t do that to his brother either. He said Jaime would be terribly hurt if he came over to Belfast and couldn’t crash with him, like he had done a few times while he’d been at Queen’s. In the call on Saturday he’d said that now just wasn’t a good time for Jaime to come over to Belfast, but that he would keep thinking about it and wouldn’t stop looking for him.”

  “Did he elaborate on what he meant by, ‘now is not a good time'?” McCusker offered sensing an angle.

  “Never did,” Whitlock replied straightening it out again.

  “Was Jaime aware you were planning all this?” McCusker asked.

  “No, but I was looking at other options as well.”

  “Anything else stick in your mind from your telephone conversation with Adam?”

  “Not really.”

  “Would you say he was in a good mood?” McCusker asked.