by Derek Fee
‘I don’t like you,’ Jennings said when Wilson had left the room. ‘And I don’t like having my arm twisted.’ He removed the cassette from his desk drawer and pulled the tape out squashing it in his hand as it went. ‘You should be careful who you push against. Some people are apt to push back harder. You must take great care of yourself, Miss Cummerford. You may think that you have won a battle, but this was simply a skirmish. The battle is yet to come. Now get out of my office.’
Wilson was walking up and down outside Jennings’ office when Maggie Cummerford exited. ‘What in God’s name are you up to?’ he asked as he towered over her.
‘I told you months ago that I wanted to do a profile on you,’ she stood staring up into his face. The combination of American and Ulster accents was as soft as a summer rain. ‘You should have said yes then. You’re an interesting fellow – former sports star, head of the Belfast Murder Squad and partnered up with a leading light of the legal establishment with a baby on the way.’
‘Surely to God you could have done your profile without looking over my shoulder during a murder investigation.’
‘The opportunity was too good to waste. This case alone is a career maker for a journalist with the inside track. At the same time, I get to know you as well as any human can,’ she smiled. ‘Not in the biblical sense, although I might be up for that too before we’re finished.’
‘I need to get back to the station, and we need to establish some ground rules.’
‘I’ll take a lift. I don’t think DCC Jennings likes me.’
‘Join the club.’
CHAPTER 19
Lizzie Rice’s body was released at midday. Sammy Rice had barred his father from the mortuary. He was in control of events, and he wasn’t going to allow the auld fool to screw things up. Since the night of the murder, Billy had been buried in a whiskey bottle, and every now and then he came out with some shit about murdering ten Taigs for Lizzie. Luckily, nobody was listening to the bastard. The house in Malvern Street was still a mess. The crime-scene tape was gone, but Sammy hadn’t had time to have the blood and brain cleaned up. The hearse delivered the coffin bearing Lizzie’s body to Sammy’s house in Ballygomartin Road. Sammy had moved on from the two up two down in Malvern Street that he had been born in. The house in which Lizzie body would lie was a three-story bay-windowed Victorian red brick consisting of five bedrooms, three bathrooms, a large modern kitchen and two reception rooms. Although it was a big step up from the family home, it was well below Sammy’s spending power. Sammy Rice could afford to live among the wealthiest in Belfast, but he needed to be close to his people and the source of his power – the Shankill Road. Sammy had arranged for family members to carry the coffin into the large downstairs living room where Lizzie would lie in state. It was a tradition in Ireland to hold the wake with the coffin open. The funeral home had used all their arts to give the impression that Lizzie’s head was still intact. Chairs had been placed around the edge of the living room, and Sammy placed himself next to the coffin. Word had been spread throughout the Shankill that Lizzie could be viewed and food and drink would be available at the Ballygomartin house.
‘I want a major kick-off in the Shankill this evening,’ Rice said to Ivan McIlroy. ‘Last night was only a parade. I want to mark Lizzie’s wake with a full-on riot, burning busses, Molotov cocktails, baton charges by the peelers, the whole nine yards. Are you with me? Get every mad fucker out onto the streets.’
‘I’ll get on it,’ McIlroy said.
‘What about getting’ someone close to Wilson?’
‘I’m meetin’ one of Wilson’s team this evenin’.’
‘Is it money?’
‘Aye.’
‘Give him what he asks for. I want the man who killed my mother. Make that clear.’
‘I thought that you were connected higher up,’ McIlroy smiled exposing a row of rotten teeth.
‘Our friend, Wilson, doesn’t always play by the book. He tends to keep his cards close to his chest. We need someone who’s with him day and night.’
There was a noise at the door and Rice turned and saw a leading Loyalist politician enter. He moved to greet the new arrival. The politician gripped Sammy’s hand. ‘Sorry for your trouble,’ he said. ‘Lizzie will be sorely missed.’
‘Aye, she will,’ Sammy replied. ‘Would you like to see her?’
If the mood at the two o’clock briefing was despondent, by six o’clock desperation had set in. The second level of interviews had drawn a blank and the research into Lizzie Rice’s background had added a couple of hundred additional individuals who would like to have done serious damage to her. Moira had managed to add a second trawl through the forensic evidence but aside from the few fingerprints that could not be identified there was nothing new to report.
‘It’s the perfect fucking crime,’ Wilson said as the team completed their reports. ‘But then again, we all know that there is no such thing as the perfect crime. The murderer couldn’t go through that house, commit a murder and leave without leaving behind some trace. There’s a hair, a piece of fingernail, something with DNA on it in that house that we haven’t found yet. I just cannot believe that we’ve hit a brick wall so soon in this investigation.’ He looked around at the faces of his team and saw reflected in them a measure of his own despondency. Maggie Cummerford sat in the corner of the Squad Room beyond the team tapping away on her laptop. Wilson was wrestling with how and why she had been landed on him. It was way outside of protocol to give a journalist inside access to an on-going investigation. And yet Jennings had been so on board that he had squared the break in protocol with the Chief Constable and issued a written instruction. What was the greasy bastard up to this time? Whatever it was it wasn’t going to be good for him. But Cummerford had said that Jennings didn’t like her. Was she trying to flim-flam him to get him onside? All he knew was that she was a major distraction. He should be concentrating on finding Lizzie Rice’s murderer, but his mind was engaged in trying to divine Jennings’ new plan for him. He spent an hour setting boundaries with Cummerford. She was to clear all her reports with him, and she was to leave his private life just that – private.
‘Go home, get some rest and for Christ’s sake let’s pray that something breaks soon. Lizzie is lying in state this evening so maybe one of us should pop round there. Any volunteers?’
No hands were raised.
‘OK, Peter you just volunteered. You don’t have to stay all evening. Just drop in and see who’s about. The funeral’s the day after to-morrow. Moira and I will attend.’
‘You think that wise, Boss,’ Harry Graham said. ‘Moira I mean.’
‘Maybe you’re right. Peter and I will go.’
Wilson looked at Moira, and she pointed at her watch. Fuck it, he thought, the drink with Guilfoyle.
The muted television over the bar of the Crown was showing the news, and the main story was the crowd gathering in the Shankill. The footage could have been taken any time from the early nineteen seventies until the present. The age of the rioters hadn’t changed. Most were teenagers out to cause a bit of mischief. They wore balaclavas that had probably been handed down from their rioting parents. The riot police were already assembling in the back streets, their black body armour making them look like an army of giant beetles. There was nothing to show that the footage was current. It could just as easily have been library footage. Wilson turned away from the television. He didn’t need the added aggravation. He headed for the lounge where the ubiquitous television was banned. Moira and her boyfriend were already seated at a table in the corner under one of the stained-glass windows.
‘Great pub,’ Brendan Guilfoyle rose and held his hand out towards the approaching Wilson.
‘The Crown is not a pub,’ Wilson said taking the hand and shaking it. ‘It’s an institution.’ He looked over the young man much as Moira’s father might do. Although Guilfoyle had an Irish name, his look was distinctly unIrish. For a start, his skin was swarthy most unli
ke the usual alabaster skin colour with which God had endowed the Irish people. He had the dark hair of his father’s race but with very clear blue eyes. He was well-built and moved his body like an athlete. Moira had done all right for herself, he thought. A waiter appeared at his side. ‘Pint of Guinness,’ he said and sat in the vacant chair. ‘One drink. I’m expected at the opening of an art exhibition, and I promised I wouldn’t be late.’
‘It’s great to meet you,’ Guilfoyle said as soon as Wilson was settled. ‘Moira’s told me so much about you.’
It was like listening to those old newsreels of JFK, Wilson thought. Guilfoyle’s lilting Bostonian accent washed over you like a warm wave. ‘Nothing bad, I hope.’ He looked at Moira and smiled.
‘Quite the opposite. I’d go into it but I don’t think Moira would appreciate it.’
Both men looked at Moira, and she blushed.
‘So you want to help out on the Rice murder,’ Wilson said when his pint arrived.
‘I wouldn’t be so presumptuous. I’m here for a year lecturing in clinical psychology but back in the States I also give a course in criminal psychology. I’ve even written a book on it although according to my publisher, no one seems to want to read it.’
‘Maybe I’ll make it my one book to read this year,’ Wilson smiled and sipped his pint.
‘Yeah, guess most people in your business don’t get much time to read the musings of guys like me who live in ivory towers. But I do have some experience of working with the FBI and the local Boston police.’
‘And what can you tell me?’
‘The killer knows your victim real well, and has been personally affected by her. The killing is personal, and the killer bears a hell of a grudge. My guess would be that this is a revenge killing.’
‘I suppose Moira has made you aware of who Lizzie Rice is, or was I should say. You could probably fill a football stadium with people who have some kind of grudge against her.’
‘This was no ordinary grudge. The victim did something very bad to the killer or to someone he loved. The hammer and the more or less destruction of the head are significant. I just can’t figure out why yet. The question is when did the bad thing happen and why the killer decided to strike now? I don’t want to get Moira into trouble, but she tells me that the crime scene was clean. The killer left nothing. My guess is that whoever the killer is, he knows something of police procedure. At least enough to make sure that no evidence was left at the scene.’
Wilson studied his half-empty glass.
‘He doesn’t believe in profiling,’ Moira said.
‘Think about what you just told me,’ Wilson said. ‘The killer bears a deep grudge against Lizzie. Well, you’d hardly kill for no reason. There’s always a motive. Like you, I’m interested in the method. There are lots of ways of killing people besides bashing their brains out. I think that the method was chosen specifically. The conclusion on the knowledge of police procedure is interesting, and new. I hadn’t got there.’ He tipped his glass in Guilfoyle’s direction.
‘Thanks,’ the young man beamed. ‘Maybe I’ll make you a believer in profiling before the case is over.’
Wilson glanced at Moira. ‘Have you ever heard the expression ‘don’t call me, I’ll call you’.’
Guilfoyle looked downcast. ‘You’re kickin’ me to the curb?’ he asked.
Wilson drained his glass and stood up. ‘Maybe we’ll talk again. In the meantime, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’
‘That’s a very short list of don’t dos,’ Moira said.
CHAPTER 20
Gallery One in the Federesky Gallery on North Street in Central Belfast is a three hundred square foot room with cream tiles, and white walls bathed in extreme white light from a series of fluorescent tubes attached to the ceiling. Wilson picked up a glass of red wine from a tray held by an attractive young lady dressed in a white blouse and black skirt. It was exactly seven o’clock, and as he glanced about the room, he was pleased to see that Kate had not yet arrived. It was one up for him since she had sworn that she would be on time and insisted that he also be prompt. He didn’t bother to take a catalogue since he had no real interest in art. His idea of something that should hang on a wall was a photo of Brian O’Driscoll scoring a try. Still, since he had been given a free glass of wine, it was important to look like he had a passing interest in the paintings, so he ambled around the room stopping at strategic points to gaze at canvases that said absolutely nothing to him. Kate was the art buff, and she generally left these openings as the proud owner of some outlandishly expensive piece of inexplicable art. He hoped that she would turn up soon. He found these gatherings on the upper side of extremely boring. The crowd in the room was made up essentially by what he called the ‘cravat gang’, pseudointellectuals who could make sense of the series of lines and dots that seemed to be the staple of modern art. Added to his lack of interest was the fact that he didn’t move in the art buying circles, so without Kate, he was apt to spend all his time alone.
‘Have you seen anything that you like?’
Wilson whirled around expecting to see Kate standing behind him but was surprised to see their new pathologist Professor Reid standing with wine glass in hand. This was not the Professor Reid of the blue plastic jumpsuit or the hospital scrubs. She was wearing a red silk evening dress that showed off her spectacular figure and contrasted perfectly with her lightly tanned skin. In a word, she looked stunning. ‘Professor Reid,’ Wilson tried to hide the look of both shock and admiration on his face. ‘I’ve just done a tour of the room and there are several interesting pieces. You’re into art?’
‘Somewhat, but most of my collection is African. I wouldn’t have thought that I’d find you in some art appreciation circle.’
‘Appearances can be deceptive,’ he sipped wine delicately.
She laughed. ‘I would have thought you would have been more at home banging a few heads together at the riot that’s taking place in the Shankill.’
‘Those were the days,’ he smiled as though savouring a memory. ‘Thank God the population of the Province is so riot prone. I’ll probably get a chance to bang some heads together in the very near future. In the meantime, I’m off duty, and I’ll have to content myself with art appreciation. I can’t keep calling you Professor Reid. I always called you predecessor Charlie.’ He was intoxicated by her smell. Her perfume was not overpowering but perfectly understated.
‘You were privileged. He always insisted that people address him as Charles. Anyway, my name is Stephanie, but you can call me Steph.’
‘Ian,’ he said simply.
‘I know. You have a way of looking at a woman, Ian. I suppose other people have told you that.’
Other people had told him that, generally just before he had taken them to bed. He looked over her shoulder and saw Kate entering the room. She had come directly from work and was dressed in her habitual black Chanel suit and white blouse. She tossed her head and her perfectly coiffed blond hair swung from side to side. She scanned the room looking for him. There were now two stunning women in the room. ‘Excuse me,’ Wilson made eye contact with Kate. ‘My partner has arrived. I should go to her before she sees something she likes which is on the expensive side. I’ll see you soon.’
‘I look forward to it,’ she said. ‘We really should have a discussion about the Rice case. I’ve had the technicians in the forensic lab look at issues like the height of the assailant. The report should be with you to-morrow.’
Wilson could see Kate waving from the other side of the room. ‘Soon,’ he said.
He didn’t like the way he was feeling. The pounding in his heart and the erection in his pants were part of the old Wilson, the asshole Wilson, the Wilson that would betray the women he was with for a pair of flashing eyes and a trim body. He had thought that the bad part of him no longer existed, but he knew from experience that leopards rarely changed their spots. The old Wilson had been put aside, but he hadn’t entirely disappeared. He knew t
hat he loved Kate but Stephanie Reid had awakened in him feeling that he thought he had put to bed.
‘Who’s the blond?’ Kate said as he leaned in to kiss her.
‘It’s good to see you too,’ he said as Kate kissed the air above his cheek.
‘That wasn’t the answer I was looking for. I leave you alone in a roomful of strangers for five minutes, and you manage to hit on the best-looking woman in the room. Who’s the blond?’
‘That, my dear, is Professor Stephanie Reid, Old Charlie’s replacement as pathologist. She newly arrived from some Godforsaken part of Africa. She did the autopsy on Lizzie Rice.’
‘Beauty and brains, I’m getting more jealous by the minute. And you were discussing her cutting technique with her, I suppose.’
‘Just general chitchat. Art, and the like.’
Kate raised her eyebrows and moved her left hand to her stomach. ‘You have stuffed this package into me and day-by-day I’m turning into a blimp. There are times when I resent you for doing this to me. But that resentment would be nothing if I thought that you were casting your eye over a replacement who has the figure of a Goddess and the audacity to wear a red dress like that. That thing in your pants would be at serious risk if that small thing in your head doesn’t manage to control it. I much preferred the old pathologist. Principally because he was a man.’
‘I love you when you’re angry.’
‘Oh, this isn’t angry. This is tired and emotional. You really don’t want to see me being angry.
He put his hand on her stomach. ‘Don’t go upsetting junior for no reason. You know they can feel your emotions. And by the way, you’re the most attractive blimp I’ve ever seen.’
‘Kate darling.’ A man sporting a cravat and a white linen suit air-kissed Kate. ‘Let me show you some of my work.’ He took her arm and led her away. As soon as her back was turned, Wilson looked at where Stephanie Reid had been standing. He was just in time to see her retreating figure leaving the Gallery. He turned back and started to follow Kate and the artist. A feeling of self-hate consumed him. The bad part of him contributed to the death of his ex-wife. If he didn’t learn for history, then perhaps he would be doomed to repeat it.
