The White Tower

by Dorothy Johnston

  ‘No. Look, I’m on my way to get something. It can’t wait.’

  ‘Did Niall give you anything to keep for him?’

  ‘You asked me that before.’

  ‘Did he send you the castle picture?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘It’s not something I’d be likely to forget.’

  ‘What about the other radiotherapists, the ones Niall worked with?’

  ‘I know I said I’d help you with addresses. I will help. If I can.’

  ‘Why did they all leave at once?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me that there’d been almost a complete turnover of staff?’

  ‘It didn’t seem important.’

  ‘Was Niall asked to leave?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘But you knew Niall was having difficulties with his boss. What did he tell you?’

  ‘He said whatever problems there were, the department would deal with them.’ Eamonn paused, then added, ‘He was loyal to Dr Fenshaw.’

  Again, the undertone in Eamonn’s voice I remembered from before, as though loyalty masked a connection that was deeper and more ­interesting.

  ‘Were they lovers?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Were you?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You and Niall.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Fenshaw?’

  ‘It’s none of your business.’

  ‘Fenshaw has a lover here on the hospital staff doesn’t he?’

  ‘Look,’ Eamonn said, beginning to walk away. ‘What difference does it make?’

  ‘Fenshaw and Colin Rasmussen have a thing. Or did.’

  ‘I don’t have anything to do with either of them personally. I told you that.’

  ‘Was Niall jealous?’

  ‘Of Colin Rasmussen? That’s absurd.’

  ‘That last night—did Niall mention a specific date to you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You said he was happy and excited. That’s what you told the police. Did they ask you why?’

  Eamonn stared at me, his grey eyes angry. I was glad I’d made him angry. ‘It was the day after, for God’s sake. I know you mean well, and you’re doing this for Niall’s mother. But it was the next day—I might’ve said anything.’

  ‘You said Niall was happy.’

  ‘I’ve been going over and around that since the last time you were here.’ Eamonn lowered his head and scratched at his hairline, as if he could scratch away both his thoughts and our conversation. ‘I should have picked up on it, shouldn’t I? I should have seen he wasn’t happy. Some sort of crazy—’

  ‘Or relieved that he’d finally made up his mind?’

  ‘That’s just it—if you’d known Niall—he was the last—’

  ‘You don’t believe Niall killed himself?’

  ‘I have to believe it, don’t I? It happened.’

  ‘But you don’t believe it. Why didn’t you tell the police about your doubts?’

  ‘I don’t know. I just thought—whatever had happened—maybe it was better.’

  ‘Is it possible that Niall met someone later that night who turned what he thought was good news into the worst?’

  Eamonn shook his head and said he didn’t know. ‘I don’t think you should come here any more.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I just don’t, that’s all.’

  ‘Are you embarrassed to be seen talking to me?’

  ‘Not embarrassed—’

  ‘Scared?’

  ‘I have to go.’

  ‘I’m sorry for upsetting you,’ I said.

  . . .

  Dr Fenshaw was bearing down on me from a yellow arrow in the middle of a long corridor. He leant forward, smiling confidently. His white coat made other men’s look grey.

  ‘I didn’t think I’d be seeing you again. I thought by now you’d have done your duty Mrs Mahoney.’

  I smiled back. ‘Then you mustn’t have thought my duty would take me very far.’

  We were a few steps from some benches by a fernery. A man in a wheelchair was sitting motionless, staring at the plants.

  ‘Clearly I was wrong,’ said Fenshaw with another smile. ‘But, forgive me, what more can you accomplish?’

  ‘Why do you think Niall Howley killed himself?’

  ‘Niall became mentally and emotionally unbalanced.’

  ‘Is that why you wanted him to leave?’

  ‘Who told you I wanted him to leave?’

  ‘Did you try and fire him?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘What about the others?’

  ‘What others?’

  ‘Did all the radiographers who left have mental and emotional ­problems, or was it only Niall?’

  ‘Who have you been talking to?’

  ‘Some people who met Niall through the MUD.’

  I watched Fenshaw perform an act of re-arranging. It was a tribute to his skill that this re-arranging went on behind a surface that remained open towards me, still disposed to like me, even prepared to be hurt if I failed to meet his frankness with my own.

  ‘You’re right, of course,’ he said. ‘Niall wasn’t the only one with problems. The team did get off to a rather shaky start. They’re pulling together much better now.’

  ‘What about Colin Rasmussen?’

  ‘What about him?’

  ‘Why did he stay when the others left?’

  ‘Colin’s an extremely bright young man, and he’s matured a lot in the last year or so. He’s learnt his limits—his and other people’s. There was a danger, for a while, that he’d burn himself out. But I think he’s past that now.’

  ‘Who burnt themselves out?’

  ‘Apart from Niall? I’m not sure it’s really fair to go naming names. Has Colin been talking to you about his former colleagues?’

  ‘He answered my questions about Niall.’

  ‘If a member of my staff has been indiscreet, then I need to know.’

  ‘No one’s been indiscreet. Your staff seem extremely loyal.’

  Fenshaw leant forward again. It struck me that, earlier references to begging bowls notwithstanding, he was unused to having to ask twice. He pulled up the sleeve of his white coat a fraction, and looked at his watch. If he wanted to maintain the fiction that he was the one doing the dismissing, then that was fine by me.

  Once I was away from him, his words began to crumble at the edges, topple sideways, as though gravity itself was altered by his presence. I wondered who he would interrogate besides Colin. I hoped it would not be Eve, and wished I’d said something to lead his suspicions away from her. Did a young bright woman such as Eve attract him, as she attracted younger men? Was he inclined both ways?

  . . .

  Home again, having fetched Katya from the creche, and heard Peter’s school news while I made him a snack, I got out the police report, and flicked back through the statements and interviews. Not to have contacted Sorely Fallon, or any of the MUD’s ex-players, struck me as a much more serious oversight now that I’d met him and Bridget.

  The pathologist’s lengthy detailing of injuries. McCallum’s statement—a neutral description of the scene, Niall’s body, how it had been found. An open mind as to how it might have got there. But by the time McCallum recorded his interviews with Eamonn and Dr Fenshaw, there had been a shift. The assumption of suicide had taken root.

  A number of questions and answers followed Fenshaw’s statement, the first few to establish the size and nature of the unit, and some general facts such as how long it had been operating.

  Then Fenshaw was asked:

  ‘Did the deceased report for work on 22 June?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you speak with the deceased during the course of the day?’

  ‘Yes, I did.’

  ‘How did the deceased appear to you?’

  ‘He appeared withdrawn and upset.’

 
‘Did you ask him why?’

  ‘It was my understanding that Howley had become very involved with, addicted to in fact, a computer game, and I assumed that this was the reason.’

  ‘But he remained on duty at the hospital that day?’

  ‘That’s right. I believed that Howley was capable of performing his duties. He carried out a full day of treatments and left, as you’re no doubt aware if you’ve seen the log book, at six-forty. I’d tried to talk to Howley about his ­problems but he wasn’t an easy young man to talk to. He resented, I think, questions about his private life.’

  The phone rang by my elbow. Brook said, ‘I spoke to Moira Howley. She’s very nervy isn’t she?’

  ‘Give her a chance. What do you expect?’

  ‘Didn’t deny hearing a noise that night. Didn’t deny any of the stuff about the friendship society either, though she insisted Niall never told her what happened to the money once it got to Ireland. Only thing she asked me was did I have to tell her husband that I’d been to see her.’

  ‘How did you get on with the hospital?’

  ‘Spoke to the CEO and put in a request for the computer logs for the month before Howley’s death.’

  ‘You could have a shot at Niall’s friend Eamonn,’ I suggested. ‘He knew about all the radiographers leaving except for Colin Rasmussen. And he knew that Niall was hiding something. Ask him about the night Niall died. Ask him why Niall was so happy.’

  . . .

  The modem light began to flash at me. In the same instant Katya started crying. I called out to Peter to see what was the matter.

  Just give me thirty seconds, I said under my breath, cursing Sorley Fallon for his timing.

  The crying stopped. I clicked print and crossed my fingers.

  Katya was under the sofa and Peter was busily bricking her in. All I could see between the bottom of the sofa and Peter’s line of blocks were two eyes and a brush of hair.

  Peter stood up. Perhaps he’d got as far as picturing his sister unable to escape. The set of his shoulders said he’d done what I wanted him to. He’d shut her up.

  I pulled Kat out and carried her into the office. The pages were rolling out blank. The screen had reverted to the Pegasus homepage.

  . . .

  Ivan said it was a pity Fallon had cottoned on and shut the hole so soon. He was careful not to elaborate on his disappointment. The bags under his eyes were as thick and crepey as the ones underneath mine. I could feel an argument getting ready to break cover and run.

  A knock on the door which we nearly didn’t hear turned out to be Brook.

  He looked uncertain of his welcome. ‘I was just on my way home.’

  ‘We tried a trick on Fallon,’ I said, leading the way down to the office, explaining what we’d hoped to do.

  ‘Too quick on his feet for us,’ Ivan said morosely.

  Brook wasn’t in the mood for handholding. ‘If I was a bit bigger, I’d put you both over my knee and spank you.’

  Ivan and I caught each other’s eyes.

  Brook said, ‘Go ahead and laugh,’ and Ivan, ‘Time for a cup of tea.’

  Brook followed him to the kitchen. I listened to their voices circling one another, seeing in my mind’s eye a journey, a progression, though at the same time thinking we were three lost children following a trail of breadcrumbs.

  Over coffee and frozen muffins, which were edible so long as you heated them in the oven rather than the microwave, Brook said, ‘I couldn’t get the logs for the hospital computers.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I rang the CEO and he seemed fine with it, but half an hour later he called back to say he’d had a bit of a chat with their solicitor and decided it might be sensitive and confidential information. I’ve applied for a warrant.’

  He delivered this in a flatter tone than usual. He took a bite of muffin and his expression changed to one of physical discomfort.

  ‘Spit it out,’ said Ivan. ‘Here, I’ll get you a serviette.’

  Brook drank some coffee and wiped his lips. He could be infuriating sometimes, the way he parcelled out his attention between small matters and large.

  ‘When will you get the warrant?’

  ‘Tomorrow. I’ll be able to unplug the computer and take it, but if the solicitor’s up to the mark, he’ll have a court order within a couple of hours and I’ll have to take it back.’

  He pursed his lips. It might have been the aftertaste of frozen blueberries.

  I remembered that he must have had a reason for calling in. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Sophie?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘McCallum?’

  Brook crushed the serviette in his left hand and put it on a plate. I stared at the mess of crumbs and then his hand, which kept the tension of a balled fist even after he’d straightened out his fingers.

  ‘Another kid died today. There’s no question this time that he took his own life. I told Bill he needed a change, and he told me I was past my use-by date and wasting everybody’s time. Maybe I should get sick again. Make the bastard feel bad.’

  I didn’t know what to say. Should I remind Brook that McCallum was a mate and he’d come round? Is that what I believed?

  Instead I asked, ‘How did you get on with Bernard Howley?’

  ‘He thinks Fallon was in Australia some time in the new year.’

  ‘Jesus, why didn’t he say so before?’

  ‘Claims he was protecting his wife.’

  ‘Did he tell you about the concert tickets?’

  ‘He says he didn’t know Moira was selling them. He says there was one evening, shortly after Niall broke up with his girlfriend, when he was acting very strangely. Some family occasion which had been planned for weeks and Niall announced at the last minute that he couldn’t go. He wouldn’t give a reason. Bernard wonders now if he was meeting Fallon.’

  ‘Did Moira know?’

  ‘They weren’t talking to each other much. He doesn’t think Niall told her.’

  ‘He’s guessing.’

  Brook nodded. ‘Ready enough to jump to conclusions, but that doesn’t mean he’s wrong. I’ve got someone going through airline records.’ He sighed. ‘I best be going. But be warned you two. No more back door visits.’

  Sixteen

  I heard the postman’s motorbike and went outside to bring in the mail.

  There was a letter from Bridget Connell, on notepaper with a floral border, a Woking postmark on the envelope. I held it to my nose. Faintest whiff of Bridget in silk shirt and catwalk trousers, Bridget caressing a huge flightless bird.

  ‘I don’t trust email any more,’ she began, in a loose, back-sloping hand. ‘The world is full of malicious eyes and ears.’

  ‘No kidding,’ was Ivan’s comment when I read the letter out to him that evening.

  In response to Bridget’s probing, one of the Heroes had said yes, he did recall an incident where Ferdia was being followed. It had been during a foraging expedition outside the Castle. The player doing the harassing had been Blacksnake. His threat had impressed the Hero, who claimed to have recalled it word for word.

  Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold. Playing crusader turning out harder than you thought? Do-gooders end up with blood on their hands. Get out of Canberra. Take your doomed quest elsewhere.

  The incident had stuck in the Hero’s mind not because of the taunting—taunts were common—but because Blacksnake seemed out to get Niall, not Ferdia. He knew where Niall lived, and had the means to carry out his threat in person.

  They’d gone back to the Castle, where Blacksnake had not been able to follow. The Hero had asked Ferdia if he was okay and Ferdia had said he was. He was safe from Blacksnake in the Castle, and outside it, Blacksnake didn’t have the shield and layers of protection Heroes painstakingly acquired.

  The Hero hadn’t said anything about the incident. The MUD was getting pretty chaotic by then, and it wasn’t long before he, like Bridget, decided to
quit.

  ‘By the way,’ Bridget added as a postscript, ‘thought it might interest you to know that Sorley Fallon was charged a few years back with hacking into British government computers. He got himself a hotshot lawyer and the charges were dropped.’

  For a second, I suspected Brook of holding out on me. But if he’d known about the hacking charge, he wouldn’t have missed the opportunity of pointing out the kind of shady character I’d got myself mixed up with.

  I imagined Blacksnake watching over my shoulder while I roamed the streets of Belfast, trying to recall lines from The Second Coming. Were Heroes in the habit of quoting Yeats to one another?

  . . .

  That night I checked my incoming mail. There was a message from Fallon.

  I take a dim view of folk messing about in my computer.

  I hit reply and typed, I agree. Absolutely. The dim view is mutual.

  Ivan was standing behind me, reading over my shoulder.

  ‘He’ll sick the Irish mafia onto us. He’s mad. They’re all completely mad.’

  I recalled Fallon’s tidiness, washing up the coffee mugs in the kitchen behind his shop. Colours of autumn, and the absence of even the ­suggestion of a customer. Ferdia’s symbolic execution a tidy man’s solution to a problem. I thought about the edges soft Irish voices could acquire, edges that could hide under sibilance as a knife can be hidden in a sofa cushion.

  ‘No he’s not,’ I said. ‘Just used to playing things at more than one remove. It’s a hard habit to break. What we need to do is make him see that this time it’s worth breaking.’

  ‘I’m not quite with you.’

  ‘Let’s send him the diagram and see how he reacts.’

  ‘He won’t.’

  ‘What have we got to lose?’

  . . .

  In the morning Moira said, ‘I could have confided in the police myself if that was what I wanted.’

  I stood on her front porch, knowing it was too late for an apology. She did not invite me in, or ask me what I was carrying in the manilla envelope I held under my arm.

  ‘Bernard—the police have got Bernard to say that he thinks Fallon was here, in Canberra.’

  ‘You don’t think that could be true?’

  ‘I’m sure it isn’t. Niall would have told me.’

  Moira’s face was doughy, and the lines under her eyes cut deep into her cheeks, but there was a strength in her that had not been there before.