The Keeper

by Catriona King

  “Let’s head over there. The C.S.I.s won’t be finished for another hour.”

  Coffee and an Ulster Fry later they turned their attention back to the case.

  “OK, so plenty of people hated Eilish Murnaghan and we can discuss them later. First, tell me about her husband.”

  Liam washed down his last piece of soda bread and signalled the waitress to bring a fresh pot of tea, then he cast his mind back three decades.

  “Gerry Murnaghan. In the early days he was known as Gerry M. Good looking I suppose, and a bit of a boyo with the ladies by all accounts; he mainly stuck to GBH and nicking the lead off roofs. Then he met the lovely Eilish and moved onto bigger things.”

  Craig spoke between sips of coffee. “And she was definitely the brains?”

  “Aye. Mind you, it wouldn’t have been difficult; Gerry was as thick as two short planks. He only passed two exams apparently: metalwork and P.E.”

  Craigs snorted. “Perfect qualifications for his future career. So he and Eilish became a power couple.”

  “Brawn and brains. They were caught around the same time in the mid-nineties and both served short sentences.”

  “What big events were they involved in?”

  Liam named two of the major massacres of The Troubles, killing eighty civilians between them and maiming as many more. Suddenly something occurred to Craig. He leapt to his feet and dropped a tenner on the table, then he raced out of the café with Liam scrambling to keep up.

  “Where are we going?”

  “The Murnaghans’ place; my hunch is the husband will be taken next. This is the first chance we’ve had to get ahead of our killer, thanks to you I.D.ing his wife at the scene.”

  There was no time for Liam to congratulate himself. Craig threw the car into a U-turn and screeched down Victoria Street, as Liam checked the Murnaghan’s address and wondered how to tell Gerry M about his wife.

  ****

  The Antrim Road.

  Craig’s appearance at his front door seemed to be no surprise to Gerry Murnaghan. It was barely six-thirty on a Saturday morning yet he was already washed and dressed. He beckoned the detectives in with a grim expression.

  “Have you found Eilish?”

  Craig decided to play devil’s advocate. “Why do you ask?”

  “Because I reported her missing yesterday morning, and you two are obviously cops.”

  Liam gestured him to take a seat but Murnaghan shook his balding head; age even caught up with terrorists.

  He stared at the D.C.I. quizzically. “Where do I know you from?”

  “I nicked you back in the day.”

  Murnaghan gave a cynical laugh. “Aye, I remember now. Possession of explosives in eighty-four. It didn’t stick.”

  “More’s the pity.” Liam glanced at the chair. “Are you sure you don’t want to sit down?”

  Personally he didn’t give a damn if Murnaghan collapsed and split his head, but the rules said that you had to be polite when breaking bad news, even to murdering scrotes.

  Murnaghan shook his head and turned to face Craig. “I’ll ask you again. Have you found my wife?”

  Craig kept his voice neutral. “We’ve found a woman’s body and we need an I.D.”

  Contrary to Liam’s expectation there was no fainting or shock, just a pragmatic nod before Gerry Murnaghan walked to the cloakroom to retrieve his coat. It was as if he’d always known that death was coming early and it was only a matter of when and how.

  ****

  The Lab. 7 a.m.

  If the detectives had been expecting a more emotional reaction when the widower viewed his wife’s body then they were very wrong. It was still early when they reached the morgue and there was no pressure to rush things, so they were surprised by Gerry Murnaghan asking only a single question as he stood by his dead wife’s side.

  “Where was she found?”

  When Liam answered the widower gave a perfunctory nod towards the body and then turned swiftly on his heel. As the viewing room door swung shut behind him Liam allowed himself a gawp of surprise. It was progress; two years earlier he would have gawped in Murnaghan’s face.

  “What the hell was that?”

  Craig’s expression was troubled. OK, so the Murnaghans must have been prepared for death in their youth, probably reckoning that a plastic bullet would hit them at a riot or they’d be blown apart by one of their own bombs. But after seventeen years of retirement surely they’d started to hope for a ripe old age, and for one of them to be murdered in a time of peace must have been a shock. If not, why not? It was a question that he intended to ask. First he answered Liam’s.

  “My guess is he wasn’t surprised because they’d been getting threats.”

  Liam nodded uncertainly. “Maybe…or maybe they’d always expected to die violently because they knew that they deserved to.”

  Craig laughed; it didn’t sit well beside a dead body. “Their just punishment you mean? I don’t think so; that would imply that they believed in right and wrong. If they had done do you really think they could have committed the crimes they did?”

  Liam conceded the point. “You mean psychopaths don’t have consciences.”

  “Exactly.” Craig gestured at the door. “We’d better see where he’s got to.”

  Gerry Murnaghan hadn’t strayed far. He was standing in the long mortuary corridor sucking hard on an e-cigarette. Births and deaths, both marked by a puff of nicotine.

  Craig tapped his shoulder lightly. “Mr Murnaghan, would you mind if I asked you a few questions?”

  The bereaved husband glanced around him as if to say ‘right here?’

  “There’s a relatives’ room further down.”

  Liam led the way and five minutes later they were drinking tea in silence while Craig formulated what he was wanted to ask. Liam’s silence was much more hostile; he was remembering the Murnaghans of old. Dirt and dust and shattered glass, cast across pavements and sprinkled with dismembered body parts, the owners of which had sometimes been friends of his. The Murnaghans’ legacy had been nothing but destruction and wasted lives.

  Craig broke the quiet with a statement.

  “You weren’t shocked when you saw your wife’s body.”

  Murnaghan walked across to the kettle, setting it to boil before he answered.

  “No.”

  He didn’t meet either detective’s gaze, instead watching detached as the kettle bubbled and then snapped off. He made himself a fresh cup, not offering one to the other men.

  Craig tried again.

  “May I ask why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why you weren’t shocked.”

  A slight shrug displayed the older man’s broad shoulders to good effect. Craig imagined that he must have been striking in his youth. Tall, dark and broad; the stereotypically handsome Irish man.

  “I take it that shrug means you were expecting to be killed someday?”

  Murnaghan’s laugh in reply made Liam scowl. His one comfort when he’d been a young copper had been picturing terrorists at the moment of their deaths, snivelling and begging for their lives like the pathetic cowards that they were. The idea that they could greet death with insouciance when they’d destroyed families made him want to inflict extreme pain. Craig saw the scowl and shook his head. No matter what they thought they had to treat the man in front of them like a bereaved relative.

  Murnaghan saw the exchange and his laugh became a smile. A nasty one.

  “Of course we expected it one day, we were soldiers. We’d expected to die during the war, but even when it ended we knew there were plenty out there who still wanted us gone.” His tone grew defiant. “It didn’t make us regret what we’d done.”

  Craig asked another question quickly before Liam exploded.

  “Does that mean that you’d received threats?”

  Murnaghan sipped his tea for a moment before answering. “Yes and no. We’d had some letters but none we took seriously.”

  “Fr
om?”

  “Old loyalists itching for revenge; the odd cop’s kid…”

  Craig flinched. He didn’t fancy hauling in children orphaned by The Troubles for questioning.

  “…so called victims-”

  This time he interrupted.

  “Why, so called? Surely anyone caught in one of your attacks was a victim? There can’t be any ambiguity about that.”

  Murnaghan’s eyes narrowed. “Then there can’t be any ambiguity that anyone shot by the police or British Army was a victim as well?”

  The detective avoided the question. It was a debate for another time.

  “So you’ve been threatened by loyalists, the children of dead police officers and other victims. We’ll need details of when and whom. Anyone recent?”

  “The last was about a year ago but then I don’t suppose anyone really serious would’ve bothered to send us a warning.” The widower shrugged. “I have some letters. If you send someone round later I’ll give them whatever I’ve got.” He set down his cup and turned towards the door. “Right now I have to organise my wife’s funeral.”

  His hand was on the handle when Craig stopped him.

  “You realise that you’re likely to be a target, Mr Murnaghan.”

  Murnaghan’s face darkened. “I’m counting on it. Let the bastard come; he’ll not find me as easy to kill as a woman.”

  Craig’s voice became insistent. “We can keep you under guard somewhere safe.”

  He was answered by a snort of derision.

  “Me? Protected by the pigs? Now that would be a turn up for the books.” He glanced at Liam. “Someone like him? He’d shoot me as soon as look at me.”

  “Not the D.C.I. Some uniformed officers.”

  Murnaghan shook his head emphatically. “No guards. I can look after myself, and if I can’t then I’ll be with Eilish sooner than we’d planned.”

  ****

  When Murnaghan had left in a taxi the policemen headed down the corridor looking for John. They found him in his office early, flicking through an edition of The New Scientist with an excited look on his face.

  “Have you seen this? Jumbo squid are taking over the Eastern Pacific!”

  Craig took the magazine in fake interest then set it down out of the pathologist’s reach.

  “I was reading that!”

  “Later. Right now I need information.”

  John sighed heavily and then began reciting from memory. “Eilish Murnaghan, name courtesy of Liam’s I.D. and confirmed by her fingerprints. Aged sixty-four, weight fifty kilograms and height five-feet-two. Her body was covered in electrical burns. The most likely delivery mode was bare wires delivering high voltage shocks, probably administered by a small generator of the type found in workshops, farms, garages, etcetera. She was then shot in both knees and the base of the skull like the previous victims-”

  Craig raised a hand to interrupt. “Time of death and ballistics?”

  “Around three this morning, and the bullets came from the same guns as the others; the markings, or rather the lack of markings, match.” He was about to move on when Craig halted him with a frown.

  “What do you mean lack of markings?”

  John wrinkled his brow. “Can I get back to you on that in a few hours? I want to check something with Des first and he’s not in until after lunch.”

  Craig nodded grudgingly and he carried on.

  “We’d narrowed the gun to the two types I mentioned but Des was hinting at being able to tie it to one. But again I’d prefer to discuss it with him before saying anything definitive.”

  Liam rolled his eyes at the scientist’s caution before adding a question of his own. “Anything that might help us I.D. the killer?”

  John shook his head emphatically. “Nope. You’re on your own there, I’m afraid. The cigarette butt that you found in York Street only had DNA and a print belonging to Billy Hart, so your perp must have worn gloves.”

  Liam shook his head. “Can’t have. Annette’s witness saw the back of his hands well enough to age him.”

  “Then I can only suggest that they were clear plastic ones.” The pathologist’s voice grew emphatic. “Davy asked Des to recheck so he did, and there were definitely no prints on the butt except Hart’s.” He paused for disagreement. None came so he carried on. “He’s working his way through everything else the C.S.I.s found, but I wouldn’t hold your breath. The bodies were all dumped on dirty public ground.”

  “Eilish Murnaghan was dumped in a place that’s rarely used.”

  “Except by courting couples, if the number of used condoms is anything to go by. The C.S.I.’s had found fifteen as of two hours ago.”

  Liam groaned. “It’ll be a DNA fest.”

  John gestured towards the door. “Anything from the husband?”

  Craig shook his head. “Nothing except an expectation of death and the desire to take the killer with him. He’s refused protection so we’ll have to watch him from a distance for now. They’d both had threats, some in letters it seems, so I’ll send a uniform round there later and they’ll bring Des whatever they get.”

  John rose to his feet. “Good. Is that us finished then?” He reached past Craig for his magazine. “Natalie’s got the afternoon off and I’d like to finish my article before she disturbs my peace.”

  Liam stood up, guffawing. “You see? One year married and the gloss has worn off already.”

  John shook his head. “I love my new wife dearly, but not even love would make anyone say that she was quiet.”

  Quiet time was precious so they left the not so new scientist to his.

  ****

  Annette had walked up Dock Street three times already, with and without Dick Schofield. She’d checked that the hoarding was where he’d said it had been and that it was a quarter of a mile to the garage where he’d been going to spend the night. Everything fitted with his story; so far so good.

  They decamped to a small café and she pressed him again on the details.

  “Was the car black, navy, brown?”

  “I told you, I couldn’t tell. It was too dark.”

  Something occurred to her. “Did you notice which way it was facing? On the road I mean?”

  Schofield frowned and then his face lit up. “Yes! Yes, it was facing towards York Street, when it was parked at the left hand kerb.”

  Away from Garmoyle Street.

  “Good, good. How about…” She searched for something else to ask and remembered a street light on the corner of Garmoyle and Dock Streets. “Did you see the car pull up?”

  “I saw it approach; that’s why I hid.”

  “It came from Garmoyle Street direction?”

  He nodded enthusiastically. “It turned left into Dock Street and then I hid.”

  Gotcha.

  “There’s a street light on that corner that isn’t damaged. You must have seen the car drive beneath it as it turned.”

  He frowned uncertainly. “I don’t rememb-”

  She leaned forward urgently, interrupting. “Was it blue or black under the light? Don’t think about it; just say whatever comes into your head. Quickly.”

  Doubt, confusion and the reluctance to be wrong flitted across his face, but Annette’s urging was unrelenting. “You can do it. Just think. Blue or black under the light. Which colour was the car? Blue or black? Blue or black?”

  Schofield’s thin hand flew to his forehead. “You’re confusing me. It wasn’t… I can’t-” He stopped abruptly, his eyes widening. “It was green, bright pea green.” He shook his head. “But it can’t have been. I saw it parked at the kerb and it was a dark saloon. Really dark, not bright green.”

  Annette rested back in her chair, smiling. She would have to check the bulb in the street light but if she was right it would be a yellow sodium-vapour light, and yellow light shining on a navy blue car would make it appear bright green.

  ****

  The Demesne Estate. 9 a.m.

  “Good morning, Reggie.”
<
br />   Reggie Boyd glanced up from his newspaper, staring first at the detectives and then more pointedly at the clock.

  “What time do you call this then? You said you’d be here at eight and I came in especially.”

  Liam nodded gravely. “I forgot you were a part-time cop.” He turned to Craig jerking a thumb at the sergeant. “He hasn’t worked a Saturday since eighteen-fifty-five.”

  Craig took Reggie’s side. “Sounds great. I’d love not to have to work nights and weekends.”

  Liam took a seat, shooting Craig a sceptical look. “Get out of it. If you didn’t have sleepless nights you’d die of boredom. You’d probably take up trainspotting or something like that.”

  Reggie turned on the kettle, saying in a dry voice. “Aye, he just looks the anorak type, doesn’t he. Well, as you’re here now what can I do for you? Quick, mind. I’ve to collect Anita and the grandchildren in town at twelve.”

  Craig perched on the staff-room table, indicating his impermanence. “We told you about Rowan Lindsay.”

  “Aye, you did. And I told you that he wasn’t the worst.”

  It was a local expression that had always amused Craig. It made him wonder who the worst actually was.

  “You said he helped keep the estate kids on the straight and narrow.”

  Reggie nodded and handed them both a mug of tea. “As far as he could. Money tempted some of them too much.”

  “Could his efforts have got him killed? By the gang bosses? Maybe the Chinese or Eastern Europeans?”

  The sergeant’s shake of the head was instant. “No way. Around here the bad boys from The Troubles have kudos, far more kudos than any modern gang boss could claim. Lindsay was off bounds.”

  “So who’s your best guess for his killer?”

  The tall countryman frowned in concentration, intermittently blowing away an errant strand of hair. He reminded Craig of a steam train. After a long minute’s thinking Boyd spoke again, hesitantly.