The Dead Ground

by Claire McGowan

  There’d been a time, after it had happened, when Paula had realised her father couldn’t look at her any more. One morning, struggling to get ready for school with no clean uniform or ironed shirts, she’d gone into the kitchen, where he sat in his dressing gown drinking tea. This was before the police came to dig up the garden, before he’d lost his job and hurt his leg and everything had changed forever. When the hope they had was still full, not waned to a sliver like it was now after seventeen years.

  Paula’s hair had always been long, and her mother had liked to wash it for her over the bath, brushing it out into a fiery shine. Without this help, it was tangled in knots by the end of the first week gone. ‘Daddy, will you help me?’ She’d handed him the brush, and for a moment he’d raised it, one hand on her head like a blessing. He’d stood there like that, the brush in his other hand. Then he trembled and the brush fell on the ground, and her father had quietly left the room.

  That look, the one she’d seen on her father’s face, was the same one her mother’s former boss gave her when Paula opened the door of the station tea-room to find him there, leafing through a file of notes. A small man, red-faced and balding.

  He started. ‘Is it—?’

  ‘It’s Paula Maguire,’ she said hurriedly. ‘I’m Margaret’s girl. Paula. Do you remember me? I work here now.’

  He stumbled up with the air of a sleepwalker, holding out his hand. ‘Of course, wee Paula. God, you’re awful like her.’

  She tried to smile, shaking. ‘Everyone says that. Mr McCready—’

  ‘Oh, call me Colin, love.’ He was still staring. ‘Is there a problem with Mrs Dunne’s case? I haven’t been let in to see her yet.’

  ‘No, it’s not about the case. I just wanted to say hello. I remembered your name.’ She paused. ‘To be honest, I’d been thinking of coming to see you anyway.’

  ‘Oh?’ He looked puzzled.

  ‘Let me explain.’ She wasn’t sure she could. ‘I’ve been away for a long time, and now I’m back working here, it’s made me think about things. About my mother. I sort of feel I need to understand what happened to her.’

  ‘Closure, isn’t that what they call it?’ He fiddled with his papers. ‘You want some kind of closure?’

  ‘Something like that. I’m sorry – is there anything you could tell me? Maybe you don’t remember.’

  He made an odd grimace. ‘Sure I remember everything about it. She wasn’t in work that day, you know. She’d been off sick.’ He scratched the top of his head. A balding man even in 1993, he now looked old, and tired, and portly. No wedding ring on his stubby finger, she noticed. There was a sad little model Santa Claus on the filing cabinet behind him, the whole room dingy and tea-stained.

  ‘Did she seem strange before she went – did you notice anything weird?’

  He shook his head, and the small hiccup of hope she’d felt quickly subsided again. Stupid. He didn’t know anything either. ‘Nothing, pet. She was grand, just like always.’

  ‘Colin . . .’ She leaned forward. ‘In the file, there was some suggestion that her disappearance might have been to do with the work you did.’

  ‘The Republican POWs, you mean?’ POWs, he called them. Terrorists, others would say. In Northern Ireland, words had real and fatal consequences.

  ‘Yes. Were you involved with any cases like that?’

  He rearranged his tie, which was red and had dogs on it. ‘I was the solicitor for a few local boys accused of paramilitary involvement, yes.’

  ‘And she worked on those cases?’

  He frowned. ‘The police back in the day – they tried to say maybe she took some documents, some statements relating to the clients, confidential things like that – and she showed them to people.’

  ‘What people?’

  He spoke reluctantly, lowering his voice in that way you learned to do when you’d lived in Northern Ireland through the worst of the Troubles. ‘Special Branch. You remember the Army barracks outside town – they’d intelligence officers based there, who’d have given their right arms to see some of the documents we had. But I knew she’d never have done that. She was a professional woman. I trusted her.’

  More than trusted, Paula thought, seeing how he was lost in memories. ‘You think about her?’

  He hesitated. ‘Every day. When you walked in, I thought for a wee minute – well, you’re the spit of her.’

  She didn’t know what to say to that. ‘I don’t remember, most of the time. I can’t picture her – what she looked like. I can’t remember at all.’

  He didn’t move for a moment. Then he made a small noise in his throat, and pointed behind her. She turned and her own face looked out from the fly-blown mirror on the wall, pale with cold, puffier than usual in the cheeks. He said, ‘Like that. She looked like you.’

  She swallowed. ‘Thank you. I’m sorry to land in on you. And if you think of anything – I mean, I’m sure you told the police everything at the time – but if there’s anything at all you think of or remember, I’d really like to know it.’

  ‘All right.’ Reluctantly. ‘They had some cheek, though, with their questions. Trying to say she’d done something wrong. Of course she’d have been looking through the files, it was her job! She’s very neat, likes everything sorted. She was probably tidying them up was all.’

  ‘OK. I better go. I’ll get someone to update you on Mrs Dunne. Thank you, Mr McCready.’ She couldn’t seem to manage ‘Colin’ again, as if thirteen-year-old Paula were still making all the decisions.

  ‘I wish you’d keep in touch, love. I still miss her.’

  Paula tried to remember what she knew of her mother, those up-close childhood years when you might as well have asked what the entire world was like. A smell of Sudocrem and Anaïs Anaïs, red hair loose about her face. Just . . . Mum.

  ‘Bye now. You take care.’ He clasped her cold hand in both his clammy ones, and she felt a terrible lurch under her ribs, nausea and bottled-up sadness and awkwardness. When she shut the door again, out into the bustle and stress of the station, she realised what it was that had made her so uncomfortable. The present tense. It was just the once, but he’d used the present tense when speaking of her mother, which she hadn’t heard anyone do in seventeen years. It made her realise that all this time she’d always thought of her mother as dead. But what if, what if? The what if, that was the thing that brought you to your knees.

  Fiacra in a suit looked like he was about to make his First Communion. He’d shaved extra close for the occasion and a bit of blood had dried under his ear. ‘Thank you for the opportunity, sir, ma’am,’ he said for the hundredth time. ‘I’ve never ran my own interview before.’

  ‘Don’t cock it up,’ said Corry tersely.

  Guy was more soothing. ‘I’m sure you’ll be fine.’ Any minute now he’d be straightening Fiacra’s tie, Paula thought. She was watching from a desk in the incident room, which Gerard was sitting on top of, shirt pulled out in his usual dishevelled style.

  ‘How come a Guard gets to interview a PSNI witness?’ It’s not fair, he may as well say.

  ‘He’s on secondment, DC Monaghan. He’s either one of ours or he isn’t, no inbetweens.’ Corry’s tone was crushing. ‘We want her to see someone from the South. Anyway, you had your go with the husband. Didn’t find anything, did you?’

  Gerard glowered. ‘His alibi checks out for the doctor’s disappearance. He was at home, making phone calls to clients. Course, we’ve only his word the wife was there with him.’

  Paula hoped the real reason for choosing Fiacra to do the interview never came out. Corry was clearly at the end of her legendarily short tether. ‘Come on. We’ve got a few hours left to shut this down. I don’t want any balls-ups.’ Corry looked at her watch. ‘Let’s go, Garda Quinn.’

  Fiacra’s face was a mixture of excitement
and terror. ‘So I just be matey with her, like?’

  ‘Yes. Make friends with her. Chummy chummy against the Northern police and all that. Get some answers from the woman. OK? Go.’

  ‘Tenner says she’ll make him cry,’ said Gerard, as they all watched through the two-way window.

  ‘No betting in my station, Monaghan,’ said Corry. ‘Anyway, you’d better give good odds. She won’t.’

  Guy said nothing, face drawn with tension. They were running out of road on this case, and fast.

  Melissa hadn’t taken too kindly to Fiacra’s shuffling entrance, two cups of tea in his hands. ‘Whoops!’ He spilled a little as he kicked the door shut. It was impossible to tell if the messiness was real or not – Fiacra’s desk at the unit was a public health hazard, which Avril often cleaned with wet-wipes when she could no longer stand being next to it.

  ‘Where’s the woman?’ asked Melissa suspiciously, as Fiacra ambled in.

  ‘DCI Corry? Oh, she had to go home to her kids. Career women, you know.’ Paula looked at Corry – an eyebrow twitched. ‘You’ll have me instead, Mrs Dunne.’ He stuck out a hand. ‘Remember me? Fiacra Quinn. Detective Garda.’

  She didn’t shake. ‘And where is it you’re from?’

  ‘Near Dundalk, out your way. Nice big place you have there. Do you farm much?’

  ‘Michael does. My husband.’

  ‘It’s hard times in farming these days. My uncle John, he near had to give his up last year. The taxes, you know. They’ve their hand in your pocket at every turn.’

  Melissa said nothing, but she did pick up her paper cup and sip the tea.

  ‘Hope that’s all right for you,’ said Fiacra pleasantly. ‘Just shout if you want anything else. I know you’ve been here a long time.’

  ‘Hours,’ she said huffily. ‘I need to get back to my own children some time, you know.’

  The children were with social services, as it happened, and possibly not likely to be delivered back to their parents without some serious questions being asked about their welfare, but Fiacra didn’t say that. ‘Of course, of course. We just need your help on a few things.’

  ‘I’ve answered all your questions. It’s against my human rights to keep me here.’

  ‘Oh, of course, of course. Just run over it again for me, would you? I’ve a hard time getting my head round this case.’

  Corry made a small noise in her throat – of triumph, or maybe amusement. Fiacra’s bogtrotter act was flawless.

  Fiacra was saying, ‘Now. I have to ask you a few wee questions about Caroline Williams. Her baby Darcy went missing recently, as you probably saw.’

  ‘What would I know? I’ve never met the woman.’

  ‘Ah, but you have spoken to her online, haven’t you? And you also spoke to Heather Campbell, who’s gone missing too. That’s a big coincidence, isn’t it?’

  ‘I’ve no idea what you mean.’

  Silence while Fiacra put the print-outs of the discussion forum row on the table and Melissa read them. ‘But you can’t—’

  ‘We know that’s you, Mrs Dunne. You gave your real name when you signed up, and anyway, it will all be cached on your computer. They’re looking at it right now. So there’s no point denying it, you see that?’

  Corry shifted on her feet. Cached. Was that too big a word for Fiacra’s country-bumpkin persona to use? Paula watched intently.

  Melissa pushed the paper away. ‘I’ve no intention of denying it. Like I said, I never met either of those women. I speak to a lot of people online. Look, these are from months ago anyway.’

  Fiacra went on. ‘You sent those threatening letters to Dr Bates, who is Mrs Campbell’s mother. That’s a fact, isn’t it? All this seems kind of connected, would you agree?’

  ‘I never—’

  ‘Now, Mrs Dunne, we found your prints all over them. Tell me, to send those, you must have felt strongly that she was a bad person?’

  ‘She was a murderer,’ said Melissa, in her prim little voice. ‘I know she killed babies, over in England. She should have been in jail. Now she’s paid her debts.’

  Fiacra leaned on the table with his elbows, lowering his voice as if speaking to a friend. ‘My sister’s after getting pregnant,’ he said confidentially. ‘I can see you won’t judge, Mrs Dunne, so I’ll tell you. The daddy did a flit on her. And I’ll be honest with you, for a while she wasn’t sure she’d keep it. She’s not got much money, you know, and she’s only twenty-two. But she’s having it now, and sure we’re all delighted.’

  Melissa sat up as if electrified. ‘That’s just the thing, Garda – there’s always joy when a baby comes. Even if you can’t raise the child yourself, sure aren’t there thousands of couples who’d be dying to take it and love it. Why should a wee innocent baby suffer because you’re too selfish to pay for what you did? When I see all these couples here going to Vietnam or where have you and getting black babies, while Irish ones are being murdered, it just makes my blood boil.’

  If Fiacra was startled by this eruption, he didn’t show it. He blinked once. ‘So when she came into town, the doctor, you didn’t like it?’

  ‘Garda Quinn, it’s no skin off my nose what other people do. I’m living right, bringing my children up in a loving Catholic household.’

  Yeah, right, Paula thought.

  ‘But who else is going to fight for the unborn? The babies have no voice. Imagine it, their silent screams, and their wee fists clinging on to life, and they’re being ripped out – shredded up – how can that be right?’

  Her voice thickened, and Paula saw the woman was crying. What appeared to be genuine tears. To her horror, she felt her own nose start to ache in response. Do not cry, Maguire, you sap. It was bullshit, bullshit self-righteousness. She put up a hand to wipe her eyes, hoping no one would notice.

  In the room, Fiacra was reaching over to pat Melissa’s hand. ‘So you were doing it for the babies. Sending the letters?’

  ‘I just wanted her to see what she was doing,’ Melissa sniffed. ‘She was going to hell and she needed to know that.’

  A confession. Bingo. You could almost hear the words ahead, the rest of it, perhaps the solution to this case suddenly rounding into view, like the moment you crest the top of a mountain. The air between Corry and Guy thickened. Paula held her breath.

  Fiacra was soothing Melissa Dunne. ‘Of course. And then did you think maybe you’d take it further, scare her a wee bit, or you know, warn her off? Show her the pain she was causing? So maybe you took her somewhere, waited outside her work for her that day . . .’

  Melissa dabbed her eyes on her sleeve. Corry’s knuckles whitened.

  ‘Mrs Dunne?’ Fiacra’s face was open, understanding. ‘If you hurt her, you can tell us. It’s OK.’

  The voice went hard again. ‘I didn’t hurt her. She’s the one who killed people. Hundreds of children she murdered. But no one’s at her door dragging her out of her house in front of her weans, are they? No one’s arresting her.’

  ‘Because she’s dead, Melissa. She got killed. She paid her debts.’

  The same phrase Melissa had used. Paula wondered if the others had spotted it; it seemed familiar for some reason.

  Melissa said, ‘Yes, she’s paid. She’ll be burning in the flames now, and no one deserves it more. But I don’t know anything about it. I was at home with my children on the day she went missing. I sent out an email newsletter from my computer – no doubt your clever fellas can check that. You’ve had my laptop long enough. And I went to Supervalu for my messages about eleven – they’ve a security camera, I’m sure. It’s not a crime to warn someone when they’re headed for the fires of hell, but that’s all I did. Anyone can see I could never have made it to Ballyterrin to go anywhere near that woman.’

  ‘But – Mrs Dunne, you never mentioned anything about
this before. You wouldn’t give us an alibi when we asked you.’

  ‘Why should I tell you anything? You’re all as godless as she was.’

  Fiacra took a deep breath. ‘And the brick through the window of Dr Bates’s house?’

  ‘I know nothing about this brick. Maybe someone else thought she was a murderer too. You can hardly blame them. I did not touch the woman. I never even met her face to face.’

  ‘You have a Jeep. We know the killer also drove a vehicle like that.’

  ‘Yes, and mine’s off the road. Surely your people checked that.’

  ‘And – you’re the right age for our suspect. You fit our profile – and you delivered your own babies at home, so you have some experience with medicine.’ Fiacra must be desperate. You never told them they fit the profile. Paula sighed. It was over.

  Melissa leaned in to Fiacra. She knew it was over too; you could see it in her smug expression. ‘I know what all your questions are about, Garda. I’m not stupid. I had my weans at home with a midwife – healthy, normal weans. I’d have no more idea than you how to cut a woman open. It’s the Bates woman who specialised in that. Now, I suggest you let me go home. I haven’t called my lawyer in here with me because this is so stupid I wouldn’t waste his time, but I’m sure we can find something you haven’t done right in this interview, and then I could make things very nasty for you.’

  And there she was, the real Melissa, sharp as a snake and twice as quick. Fiacra tried again, hopelessly. ‘Dr Bates is dead, Mrs Dunne. Who could have done it? Was it one of your supporters? If you know you need to tell us.’

  ‘I would doubt good Christian people could find it in them to slice a woman open. If you want to know who’d be able to kill in cold blood, well, she most likely did it herself.’

  Outside the room, Corry let out all her breath. ‘It’s over. Let her go.’

  Guy blinked. ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘I mean it. You were right. She’s not our woman.’ And she turned on her heel and walked off, footsteps echoing. Guy looked at Paula, stunned. He spoke into the earpiece. ‘Come out, Fiacra. It’s over.’