“Blah! I don’t go in for that kind of mumbo jumbo. He’s performing. Look at him.”
I do as instructed. Murphy has his head dropped down onto his arms. Hiding.
I turn away from the window. Take the glass from Steve. “Any sign of Baz?”
“He said he’d a report to write.”
I can’t help a thin smile. “Right.”
Entering the room, I avoid Murphy’s gaze. I sit across from him, then slide the glass of water over the desk. “Ready?”
He takes a long drink, then nods. I depress the record button and the cassette begins to roll.
“Tell us about your relationship with Eleanor.”
“Relationship?”
I treat him to a half-smile. “Yes. When did you meet, and so on?”
He looks at the backs of his hands. “Oh, okay. Actually, we met quite a while before we started working together.” He glances up, relaxes. “She was speaking at some charity thing. Encouraging big corporations to part with cash to get medicines to rural areas in India. She seemed fearless.
“Afterward, at the bar, my tutor introduced us. She was quite frightening close-up. I mean, obviously not in a physical sense. She was a stunning woman. I mean in the sense that she seemed so confident, so sure of herself, that she came across as quite stern.” He laughs. “As I got to know her, though, I realized that this was just one of her many faces. Professionally, she wore a mask, but those of us who got to know her saw glimpses of her humor every now and then.”
“Humor?”
“Yes. She had a wicked sense of humor. It wasn’t obvious or frivolous. I guess I’d call it mischievous, but what made it so delicious was that you only glimpsed it if you knew her well enough. She was a mistress of subtext and innuendo so subtle it could be delivered in a priest’s sermon and the congregation would be none the wiser.”
In my mind’s eye, Eleanor is running from me, her face tipped to the side in sunlight. The corners of her mouth raised with silent laughter.
He meets my eyes. “You look like her, you know. A little.”
A little. He means not quite as beautiful. Not that she was beautiful when she was found, but before someone helped her to her death. Hanging is not one to preserve the looks.
I tilt my head. “So you worked with her for . . . ?” I let him finish.
“Almost four years.”
“What’s your PhD about?”
His head snaps up at the change in subject. “In everyday language: the management of Staph aureus against tumor cells through manipulation of temperature.”
I raise my eyebrows. “You’re curing cancer?”
He flushes. A delicate blush of pink to the tips of his ears. “Hardly. It sounds more progressive than it is, but in reality all science is brutish and clumsy. At the moment, I’m inoculating petri dishes with staph and examining what happens to them under different temperatures and in different environs.”
“Environs?”
He shrugs, spreads his hands. “When exposed to blood, light, pigments. Believe it or not, even after so many years, it’s early days.”
I try not to jump on the word “pigments.” “And?”
He sighs. “It’s slow. It seems staph will grow unchecked in any manner of conditions.”
“Not a good thing?”
“Basically, no. Unchecked, staph will take over, and for immunosuppressed individuals it could kill, so presently not the best way to attack tumors. Preferably, we like to keep patients still breathing by the end of a course of treatment. We need control, visibility, and aggression.” His face grows dark with determination. “An army is of no use if you can’t check it and send it in the right direction.”
“And that’s why you need the pigments, to see where your army is traveling, so to speak?”
He nods. “You got it.”
“How do you get a pigment to stain the right area? Will it not simply get into the bloodstream and light up everywhere?”
He holds up a finger. “We use a pigment that’s already known to be taken up by cells exposed to radiation. Then you’ve got a substance that clings to treated regions. For a time, at least.”
“That’s impressive. Who would have thought that a simple pigment could do all that?”
“Prussian blue. It has been used for years by painters.”
I lean closer but get off the pigment trail. “Explain to me how the tutor-student thing works with a PhD. It seems a very casual affair?”
“I write the stuff, do the work. She reads, gives suggestions, feeds back on the shape, references, and language. Although I’m not an easy student. I get distracted by the research too often. She steers me back, though.”
“Steered,” I correct.
“Sorry,” he mumbles.
“You must have had a few late nights over the years. In the office together, bashing out a paper or some such.”
He looks up. “No. Goodness. Eleanor, she always went home. Always. Five o’clock came and whoosh, beat the rush back to Bray.”
“You never . . . ?”
He meets my eyes. “Never what?” Then sees my meaning.
“You were never involved then?”
“No.” Emphatic.
“I’m only asking in order to build a picture, Mr. Murphy. Did you ever kiss Eleanor Costello in a romantic sense?”
“No.” His hands are twisting on his lap beneath the table, I can see it in the movement of his shoulders.
“Did you want to?”
For a brief moment he looks genuinely haunted. “God forgive me. Yes.”
I suppress a smile, hide my victory; then: “That must have been very difficult for you.”
Fine, fair eyebrows draw down. “How so?”
“Working with”—I pause, dig up his own words—“such a stunning woman, but not being able to scratch that itch.”
A flare of nostrils. “It wasn’t like that.”
“Wasn’t it?”
“No.”
“How was it then? Did you make a pass? Did she reject you? That must have stung, Lorcan?” I use his first name, soft-like.
He pulls back. “She was married,” he says. Angry.
I hold his gaze. “Yes,” I say. “Yes, she was.”
I give him some time to collect himself, take a drink of water. He wipes his mouth with his fingertips. Pink splotches have risen on the pale planes of his face. I ease the foot off. I don’t want to push him. No one wants to hit the cul-de-sac of a no-comment interview.
“Going back to your PhD. The pigment you used, what form is the pigment in when you use it?”
He waits a few seconds before answering. Cautious, wondering what corner I’ll push him into now.
“Liquid,” he replies. “But we make it up from powder.”
“This pigment, Prussian blue, is also used as an antidote for thallium poisoning. Did you know that?”
He pulls himself up in the seat, looks around the room. I’ve surprised him. “What has this got to do with Eleanor?”
“The pigment that you’re working with has been found on our murder victims—Eleanor Costello, Amy Keegan—and thallium was found in Peter Costello’s blood. Do you know anything about that?”
His mouth is agape. He stutters, pushes back from the table. Hand outstretched, he shakes his finger at me.
“I know what you’re trying to do here. Now that you can’t blame Peter, you’re going to try to pin this on me. I did not do this. I did not kill Eleanor or Peter.”
“Calm down, Mr. Murphy. I’m asking you a simple question. Do you know how Prussian blue, a pigment that you’re working with almost daily, got onto your tutor’s dead body?”
“No.” He goes to the door. “I don’t need this. I’ve tried to help you, but I don’t need this. Let me out.”
I stand slowly, straighten my jacket, then approach him. He backs away from the door like a frightened animal, but there is liquid hatred glowing in his eyes. I open the door, then offer my hand.
“Helen will sign you out. Thank you for your time, Mr. Murphy.”
He leaves, ignoring my hand, and I can’t help the smile that pulls at the corner of my mouth.
Steve is out of the viewing room immediately.
“You let him go!”
“We don’t have enough to hold him. Helen will put a tail on him. I want to see if he’ll try to run.”
Steve pushes a hand through the copper of his hair. “Jesus, you love chasing missing guys, don’t you?”
I meet his eyes. “In my experience, they only run when they’ve something to hide.”
* * *
—
LORCAN MURPHY’S FIRST move becomes clear the next morning. Clancy storms into my office and slaps the Dublin Herald down on the desk.
“The fucking rat,” he says.
The headline reads, “Blue Murder,” an entire section on the pigment Prussian blue, its colorful history, dark and favorable uses, and a renewed summary of our cases. The thrust of the article centers around the thallium story line, with the journo taking his readers back to the olden days when the heavy metal was used to kill silently.
“Murphy,” I whisper. “He sold out.”
“The fucking smartarse. Well, he’s not as smart as he thinks, the fucker.”
“He was pretty pissed when he left. This is his two fingers.” I’m skim-reading. The article gives a summary of how our victims met their ends, how Costello had slowly been poisoned before his body was found in the Liffey. There is no mention about where the pigment was found on Eleanor’s or Amy’s body, but there in the text Lorcan Murphy has shat all over his innocence.
“Here,” I say, pointing at the section. “This is what we wanted. I never told him that Eleanor had ingested the pigment. Here’s the slip.”
Clancy leans over my shoulder. “Well, he knows where he can stick his two fingers now. As I said before, Frankie, I’d almost feel sorry for this fucker. You gonna pull him in again?”
I shake my head. “No. Let him think he’s gotten away with it this time. Instinct tells me we can learn more from him when he’s out there than when he’s in an interview room. When we bring him in, I need there to be no doubt.”
In the article, there’s a photo of Eleanor and Peter, taken on their wedding day. Fine blond hair cut in a sharp line along the jaw, softened across the forehead with a light fringe. Rose-pink lipstick, a gentle glow of blusher over the cheeks. In the photo, Eleanor leans in against her husband’s right side. Their hands are gripped together, sandwiched between them at their hips. In Eleanor’s right hand she holds the bouquet, a round posy of white roses. I imagine each bud studded with a pearl pin.
Peter is dark and handsome beside her. In her heels, she is a little taller than he, and with the proximity of their half-turned postures, she is looking down into his eyes. His hair is thick, inky black waves, the hairline almost identical to his sister’s. His left leg is outstretched, his toe off the ground as if he has made to walk on and has been pulled back for the photograph. His face, unguarded, shows an awkward half-smile. Eleanor’s is theatrical; her entire face is beaming.
CHAPTER 19
MID-DECEMBER AND NOAH Dillon kneels close to the banks of the Liffey as it tumbles through Newbridge in County Kildare. His father casts scented dummies into the water; then, with a swift hand command, sends his dogs in after them. They are large animals, built for water and working. They sweep by Noah and slide into the thick cold water.
Normally, Noah would watch. There is a thrill about the way the dogs lap up the dummy, turn in the fast water, then stroke back to the bank with ease, strong muscles powering and coats wet and gleaming. But this morning, Noah has found himself a task.
At the water’s edge, where the river is shallow and ripples around straggling weeds and twisted roots, he sees the edge of a red bag, the strap of which is caught over a sunken tree branch. He’s been trying to unhook it for what seems an age. He would have given up after the first couple of attempts as his hands are stiffening with the cold and the knees of his jeans are soaked through, but the zip of the bag is partially open and he thinks he can see the glint of something metal inside.
The dogs shake themselves off and his father casts the dummy far down the river again. Noah reaches out with his makeshift fishing rod. His tongue pushes against his cheek as he tries to reach the bag. The branch he’s using snags on the bag, and he manages to drag it close enough that if he reached down on his tummy he could fish it out with his hand. He glances up. His dad won’t like it if he gets his coat covered in mud. But his dad is busy, directing the dogs back to shore.
Quickly, Noah stretches out on the bank. He shoves his sleeve back, then reaches into the water. The bag rises with ease. He drops it on the bank behind him and tries to wipe his coat down.
“Noah! Your coat!” His dad looks over his shoulder. “What’s that?”
“A bag.”
His dad sighs. “I know it’s a bag. Where’d you get it?”
Noah points into the water. “It was in there, I just pulled it out. I think there might be treasure inside.”
His dad shakes his head. He doesn’t believe there could be treasure.
“I saw it. Something silver.”
Gary Dillon smiles down at his son. He tells his dogs to sit, to wait, then squats next to the bag.
“Treasure, is there? Well, now, that would be something.”
Noah scoots to the side. Excited. His fingers drag the bag forward, tug at the zip, but Gary Dillon stops him.
“Let me, son.”
There is an uneasy feeling developing in Gary Dillon’s chest.
“Not all treasure is the good kind.”
He unzips the bag and takes a peek inside. He’s not sure what he was expecting but is somewhat relieved by what he finds.
“Lemme see!” Noah cries, and reaches over the lip of the bag to look.
The bag contains a set of keys—two on a key ring—and a mobile phone.
Noah is visibly disappointed. “I thought there’d be treasure.”
Gary Dillon ruffles his son’s hair, contemplates leaving the bag hanging on a nearby branch. Perhaps whoever lost it will come back looking for it. He reaches out to leave it on a tree; then, not sure why, thinks better of it. He hooks the leads onto his dogs and, taking his son by the hand, heads back to his van.
At home, he shows the bag to his wife, who agrees that he should drop it into the Garda station on his way to work tomorrow, being that some poor soul will be glad to have the keys back, even if the phone is ruined. When their young son is tucked in bed, they relax in front of the TV to watch the news updates on the Costello and Keegan murders.
* * *
—
ONCE IN A while the gods of justice appear to rouse themselves from their stupor to throw a desperate crime team a bone. Figuratively and sometimes literally. In this case, we have a phone and a set of keys. Or will have. Hot droplets of coffee run over my hands as I rush to get into the driver’s seat. Baz is seated, waiting for me to head back to the office so that we can touch base with Helen and see whether TeeganRed is making any friends online. I pass him the tray of drinks and clip on my belt.
“Assume crash position,” I tell him. “I’ve just had a very interesting call while waiting to be served. I’m either heading for the biggest letdown of this twisted case yet, or we’ve just been given a break.”
Baz knows better than to say anything and simply raises an eyebrow, helping himself to a coffee.
* * *
—
THE OFFICER WHO greets me at the station in central Kildare was sensible enough to ask Gary Dillon if he’d mind staying put for the h
our or so it would take for me to get there. When I arrive, I have the chance to hear how it was he noticed the bag, and he tells me that it was his son who located it. He phones his wife, and she agrees to take me to the spot where the bag was found, so that her husband can go to work. Things get better when she allows her son to show me exactly where he pulled the bag from the tangled roots at the water’s edge.
I thank them, and once they’ve left, I have the pathway sealed off and instruct a forensics team to scour the area for any other scraps of evidence.
“It’s a way out, isn’t it?” Baz says on the way back to the car from the river.
“Meaning?”
I hear the rustle of his coat as he shrugs. “A way out. Distance-wise. From Dublin. From Bray, from Clontarf.”
I step over a crumbling branch, pull my coat tighter against the damp air. “Yes.”
“Might not be her phone. Could be anyone’s.”
“Yes.” I set my jaw.
“And there’s the water damage to think about.”
I stride on. “It’s Eleanor’s phone, Baz. We’ve checked the keys, sent them to Dublin, they open her office at the uni. Stop cushioning me for a blow that won’t come.”
“I’m not. Just cautioning. I’m not sure dropping that phone in a bag of rice will make it work again, that’s all.”
I give out a bark of laughter. “At least the officer at the station had the sense to dry it out a bit. But you’re underestimating modern-day science, Baz, just like this murdering cretin did.”
I feel a warm glow in my chest. The dark shadow of evil that we are hunting almost succeeded in sliding away, almost got too far ahead, but now he’s that much closer.
Our phone tech, Emer O’Neil, narrows sharp eyes on the mobile in front of her. She’s another newbie, not just to the department but to her field. She looks fresh from the classroom, but there is a confidence in her stance, an ease in her movements that tells me she’s completely in her element when it comes to the challenge I’ve presented her with. She picks up the evidence bag, slides the phone about inside it, wrinkles her thin nose.
Too Close to Breathe Page 17
