The Gathering of Souls

by Gerry O'Carroll

  ‘I’d had a few, it’s true.’

  ‘You passed out completely.’

  ‘And when I woke up, he wasn’t there.’

  ‘That’s what you say.’

  ‘It’s how it was, Jane. I’ve nothing to gain by lying to you, he’s already walked from the Four Courts. The fact is, when I woke up, Conor wasn’t there.’

  Jane sat for a few minutes digesting what she had heard, then she spoke to Murphy.

  ‘Look, guard,’ she said, ‘I appreciate how serious this is, but I also know how you coppers work. I’ve a second cousin who’s right up there on your wish-list, and I’ve been spoken to by the guards more times than I care to remember. When someone goes missing, you’re under pressure for a quick fix. It really doesn’t matter who you get, so long as you get someone.’

  Molly looked across the table at her then. ‘I suppose if you think like that, it makes it easier to give a man his alibi,’ she said. ‘I suppose it’s OK to lie if you think you’re in love. As far as you’re concerned, the police set him up once, which means they must be trying to do it again.’

  She glanced at Murphy briefly. ‘The thing is, I never had any of that. When I was going out with him, I’d no experience of how sneaky coppers can be, and I didn’t think I was in love. I was just so shit-faced I’d no earthly idea what was going on. Conor told me there wasn’t a minute we weren’t together, save when he went to get me some fags. But the guards told me he’d been spotted by two different people talking to Mary Harrington, and after a bit the reality that a girl had been murdered came home to me. It was serious; very serious. Not just because of the killing, but because if I got it wrong, I might implicate a man who had nothing to do with it. I thought long and hard, believe me: I made myself work it through again and again, until I thought I’d got it right. I went back over it after me and Conor broke up, and what I told the guards was that I couldn’t account for where I was myself that night, let alone anyone else. It was the truth, Jane. You heard me testify, and I’d have thought that to someone like you, there isn’t much that’s more important than the truth.’

  Pushing back her chair, she got up. ‘That’s all I’ve got to say: a woman is missing, just as Mary was - only this time, she could still be found alive. Because I couldn’t remember to begin with, I thought it best to go along with what Conor told me, and that’s why I gave him his alibi. I wasn’t lying, I just didn’t remember.’ She broke off then and looked Jane in the eye.

  ‘You, on the other hand, weren’t drunk on Sunday night, so if he wasn’t with you, you’re lying – and given all that’s happened, maybe you should ask yourself why.’

  Tuesday 2nd September 2 pm

  In the visitors’ reception at Limerick Prison, Patrick Maguire was signing in. He knew the desk sergeant well: an old friend of his brother, he’d come down to the house they owned in Ballybunion when the racing festival was on.

  ‘Is there any word on Quinn’s wife?’ the sergeant asked him. ‘I’ve been listening to the news, but it seems the media doesn’t know a whole lot.’

  ‘My brother is running the show,’ Maguire told him, ‘and I imagine he’s keeping things pretty close to his chest. He’s not a believer in investigation by television, John. He’s no time for the pundits who follow a thing blow by blow, broadcasting what the guards are doing almost before they do it.’

  ‘No, and I don’t blame him either.’

  ‘Having said that,’ Maguire went on, ‘I think that what you’re getting on the TV is just about all there is at the moment.’

  ‘Have they no idea where she is?’

  ‘They know she’s not in the canals or the Liffey, at least, which is something.’

  ‘Well, when you see Moss Quinn, tell him I send my best.’

  ‘I’ll do that, John. Bless you.’

  Maguire was visiting Willie Moore, a twenty-three-year-old who was doing seven years for dealing heroin on the streets of Limerick. He had angular features, both his ears were pierced, and he had a tattoo of the three-legged Isle of Man triskelion on his right arm. Maguire had first spoken to him a couple of years ago when he was on remand. He was not only very intelligent, but also ice cold and calculating in his opinions. Despite his young age, he was old beyond his years: he’d formed a particular view of how the world worked, and rightly or wrongly, he was living by it.

  He was from a middle-class family and had been well educated, but had dropped out of university to take up a life of crime. During their first few meetings, he’d explained to Patrick that he had looked at various careers and thought about how much money he could make from them, then compared it with what he could make as a heroin dealer.

  A warder brought him into the interview room. The first thing Moore did was glance at the clock, then check the time with the warder’s wristwatch.

  ‘Just making sure I get my full hour, Mr McShane,’ he said.

  ‘You’ll get your hour, Willie, don’t worry about that.’ The warder nodded to Maguire. ‘Patrick, good to see you, as always.’

  ‘How are you, Willie?’ Maguire asked, when the warder was gone. ‘How’re things?’

  Moore waggled his hand from side to side. ‘Things are OK, Patrick. I look forward to talking to you because it’s pretty much the only decent conversation I get. There’s no doubt that one of the downsides of being in here is the level of intellect, but that’s something I just have to deal with.’

  ‘Are you still thinking of the time as an occupational hazard, then?’ Maguire asked him.

  ‘Of course. I told you that when we first started speaking: this was a decision I made having studied all the evidence.’

  ‘Becoming a drug dealer was a calculated step, you mean?’

  ‘A heroin dealer, if we’re being exact. It’s just a market, like any other: there’s a product, a customer base and a price.’

  ‘It’s costing you seven years, Willie. Is it really worth it?’

  ‘Of course it is. I’d not be here if it wasn’t. When I started, I worked out what I was likely to get in terms of a sentence if I was caught, and then I worked out how much I needed to stash in order to be able to afford the time.’

  Maguire looked puzzled. ‘Afford it?’

  ‘It’s all part of the equation. Even with seven years – of which I’ll only do about three, by the way – I’m still way ahead financially. I’ve money aside, and plenty of it: when I get out, I’ll restructure, regroup, and off I go again.’

  ‘Just like that, with no compunction? Even though this country’s got a drug problem like never before?’

  Moore offered a sardonic smile. ‘Come on, Patrick, what do any of us care about a drug problem? This is the Celtic Tiger, one of the fastest-growing economies in Europe; we’ve more millionaires per square mile than just about anywhere. So we’ve a drug problem? So what? We’ve always had an alcohol problem, and we’ve still got a tobacco problem. The only difference is the taxes. When you get right down to it, I’m no different to the brewers or the cigarette manufacturers, other than the taxes. I’m supplying a demand at a rate people can afford. The prison time has to be accounted for in terms of the balance sheet, but the numbers still add up.’

  ‘Jesus, Willie,’ Maguire said, ‘I ought to know it by now, but you really are a cool one, aren’t you?’

  ‘You don’t get anything for nothing,’ Moore stated. ‘If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime: it’s a cliché, but it’s still a fact.’

  ‘But seven years, Willie, come on. You’re a young man, and surely life’s not just about making money. What about your mam and dad, your family? What about girlfriends, a wife maybe, children? How are you going to balance that side of life if all you intend to do is carry on dealing?’

  Moore made a face. ‘My family know what I’m like, and we all know how girlfriends come and go.’

  For a long moment, Maguire studied him. ‘You never told the police about her, did you?’

  Moore looked scornful. ‘Of course
not: that was information, and information costs. I was waiting to go to trial, remember, and as far as I was concerned, I needed all the bargaining chips I could get. They asked me, of course, but when I tried to broker a deal, they were having none of it.’ He smiled then, mercilessly. ‘With what’s going on right now, though, that little snippet might be worth something.’

  Tuesday 2nd September 2.35pm

  Murphy drove Molly Parkinson north of the river. When she got back to Harcourt Square, the incident room was buzzing with talk of Jimmy Hanrahan. Quinn was at the computer and Doyle was on the phone. There was no sign of Frank Maguire. Murphy took a moment to see Quinn on her own.

  ‘How are you, Moss?’ she asked him. ‘How’re you coping?’

  Sitting back with a sigh, he tried to raise a smile. ‘To tell you the truth, I don’t know. All the time I thought this was Maggs, there was hope that Eva was OK, that perhaps she wasn’t crammed into some godforsaken hole somewhere, because once upon a time, at least, he loved her. If it was Maggs, she might be able to reason with him.’

  ‘Are you saying that you don’t think this is him? Is that why there’s all this fuss over Jimmy the Poker?’

  Quinn glanced beyond her to the detectives, who were hunched over their desks in the outer office. He thought about the thousands of uniforms still searching. He thought about sandstone cliffs and a gravelly voice in his head.

  ‘Jimmy has a history with Maggs,’ he said. ‘We’ve always known that. And the Kerry lads found a Polaroid camera in his house.’

  Murphy sat down. ‘Was his house not searched when you found Mary’s body?’

  ‘Why would it be? Maggs was well and truly in the frame by then, wasn’t he?’ He thought for a moment. ‘I’ve had to re-evaluate. I’ve had to rethink what might’ve happened with Mary. I was so convinced it was Maggs, perhaps I was blinded to other possibilities. Jesus, it shouldn’t happen, but in this job sometimes it just does.’ He paused for a moment, reflecting.

  ‘You know Jimmy’s mother went for the rope, don’t you?’

  She nodded. ‘So?’

  ‘I just think it’s interesting, I mean in the context. At first glance, Jimmy doesn’t strike you as the poetic type. But he likes to take pictures and he likes to take them with a Polaroid camera.’ He indicated the computer screen, where he’d called up the information he and Doyle had looked at before. ‘The lilywhite boys, Murph. It meant nothing at all at first, but when you begin to look deeper …’

  ‘“The ballad of the cruel mother.”’ Murphy peered at the screen. ‘“A woman who gives birth to one or two illegitimate sons.” Moss, are you telling me there are two of them?’

  ‘Of course not. Look at the seventh line, though: “seven stars in the sky; or the seven who went to heaven”. Six women are dead already and now a seventh is missing.’

  Brows arched, she stared at him. ‘Are we talking about a link between them all, then?’

  ‘To tell you the truth, I’m not exactly sure what we’re talking about. All this crap we’re getting, though, all this cryptic bollocks: it’s the stuff of movies, for Christ’s sake. This doesn’t happen in real life.’

  Murphy was thinking hard. ‘Moss, they can’t all be linked, because five of them were single mothers and the sixth probably didn’t even know she was pregnant. The seventh …’

  ‘Has lost a son and pushed her husband away.’ Quinn gestured with an open palm. ‘With me leaving home, you could argue that Eva became a single mother. I’m covering all the bases, Murph, or at least I’m trying to. But whoever is behind this knew that when we got the note about lilywhite boys, we were bound to look it up. That means they knew what we were going to find.’

  For a moment, he broke off. ‘I’ve said it before: serial killers don’t just like the killing, there has to come a point when it’s no fun if nobody knows you’re doing it. I’m not saying this is how it is, but nobody is going to tell me now that Eva’s abduction is not linked to Mary Harrington. Liam Ahern talks about how when a person is born, they have all the hardware they need to be a human being. But they don’t have any of the software. The actual business of being a person is programmed into them, and it’s generally done by their mother. If for some reason it doesn’t get done, then potentially you’re left with someone who has no idea of how to behave, and sometimes you wind up with a psychopath.’ He pointed to the screen. ‘Whichever way you look at it, this whole thing is in part at least about motherhood: five victims were single mothers, Mary Harrington was pregnant, and my wife left our daughters on their own.’

  Maguire walked into the incident room and Quinn got to his feet. ‘Keira, listen,’ he said, ‘when the Kerry guards get here, I want you to take the camera to the lab yourself. They need to look at it under polarised light. They know that, of course they do; but they’re looking for a mechanical pattern we can match to the print. Have you got that?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said with a smile. ‘I was the one who told the super, remember?’

  ‘Course you were. I’m sorry.’

  He turned then as Maguire came in. ‘Frank,’ he said, ‘let me talk to Jimmy Hanrahan, will you? I took his statement at the fleadh cheoil, and Doyle was there when his mother’s body washed up.’

  Maguire nodded. ‘Is there anything else happening?’

  Quinn showed him what they’d got from the computer. ‘Doyle reminded me that a lilywhite is someone who comes from Kildare,’ he said. ‘That’s the only Irish connection I can find. But we looked at the poem, and the poem led us to the seven stars, as well as this “cruel mother” reference.’

  For a moment Maguire was still, and when he spoke it was almost a whisper. ‘O mother dear, when I was thine, Fine flowers in the valley, You did na prove to me sae kind, And the green leaves they grow rarely. That’s Robbie Burns, Moss. I can quote Kavanagh, you know, but that was Robbie Burns.’

  Sitting down, he looked suddenly weary, the bags heavy under his eyes, his skin waxen and sallow.

  ‘Kildare, you say?’

  ‘A lilywhite, yes: that’s the only Irish connection.’

  ‘But hold on a minute: single mothers, I thought that was the link we’d established, a link that rules out Mary Harrington and certainly Eva.’

  ‘Not necessarily.’ Quinn told him what he’d discussed with Murphy.

  ‘That’s stretching it, to say the least,’ Maguire stated. ‘And you’re forgetting that nobody knew Mary was pregnant, not even her girlfriends.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Quinn agreed, ‘that’s the bit that doesn’t make any sense. But maybe we’ve missed something; perhaps there is someone who did know: the child’s father, maybe.’

  ‘We spoke to him: the boyfriend. It’s in the file.’

  ‘We did, yes. He was on remand in the ‘back of Shaws’ and he didn’t deny or confirm anything: he just said that whatever information he may or may not have, had a price tag. He told me he knew the value of information and he’d talk only if we negotiated a price. I was in no mood to play that kind of game, and back then it didn’t matter anyway. We were looking at Maggs, weren’t we? Me and Doyle, we were all over him like a bad haircut.’

  Maguire looked askance at him now. ‘Are you saying there was prejudice then, Moss?’

  Quinn’s expression darkened. ‘We both had reason to hate the Maggot, and at the end of the day I can admit to my failings. Sometimes you find yourself dealing with someone who is just asking to go down. You know how it can be, Frank: you’ve been a copper long enough.’

  He thought for a moment, then said: ‘Maybe Willie Moore did know something. Maybe he still does.’

  Tuesday 2nd September 3.35 pm

  Maggs was in the living room when Jane got back. He heard the taxi pull in from the main road and he sat there working his fingernails into the arm of the chair. He heard the key turn in the front door and the door close, and then he heard Jane.

  ‘Conor?’ she called. ‘Love, are you there?’

  ‘In here, pet,’ he r
eplied.

  The living-room door opened and there she was, looking a little red in the face.

  ‘What happened?’ she dropped to one knee beside his chair and took his hand in both of hers. ‘What happened, love? When I heard Doyle say he was taking you to Rathfarnham, I was …’

  ‘Where did she take you?’ he interrupted. ‘That female guard, where did she take you after you left Rathfarnham?’

  ‘To Harcourt Street. You know, the building with all the satellite stuff on the roof.’

  ‘What did they say to you?’

  She stroked the hair from where it had fallen in his eyes.

  He pushed her hand away. ‘What did they ask you, Janey?’

  Rocking back on her haunches, she looked troubled. ‘They didn’t say anything very much; they sat me down in an interview room and just made me wait.’

  ‘Did you ask for a lawyer?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’m Johnny Clogs’ cousin: I can deal with the guards.’

  ‘Are you sure? You know what they’re like; they’re clever, very clever, and very, very sneaky. They manipulate what you say: they twist it around so it means something other than what came out of your mouth. I know: they did it to me, remember? They made me write it down.’

  Again, Jane took his hand. ‘It’s all right,’ she said, soothingly. ‘That’s all in the past. They used the past: twisted things so they looked different, then used it against you.’

  He was nodding now like a child. ‘That’s right,’ he said, ‘that’s what they did. That’s what happened.’

  Then he was himself again and, sitting up straight, he held her hand and looked her in the eye.

  ‘So what did they say to you, Janey? What did you say to them?’

  ‘They brought in that girl, the one from the court, the one who testified against you.’

  His eyes were orbs suddenly. ‘Molly Parkinson?’

  ‘That’s right, they brought her in and she told me how she lied when she said you were with her that night in Kerry.’