by J M Gregson
It wasn’t politically correct, that ‘my Jean’. You shouldn’t claim ownership of a woman any more. But DCI Peach found he thought better of Brian Jacobs for it, as they drove back to the station. It wouldn’t affect his judgement on whether the man was a murderer one iota.
There was an unexpected message back at Brunton police station. Would the man in charge of the Dominic O’Connor murder enquiry please ring the security service number in Manchester as soon as possible? Technically, that should have been Tommy Bloody Tucker, but the head of Brunton CID had held a media conference on the previous Saturday, and couldn’t be expected to make a weekend appearance in the CID section for at least another year.
Peach rang the number immediately. A man with the rank of commander asked him loftily if he knew of a man called Patrick Riordan. ‘I do indeed,’ said Percy breezily. ‘I had occasion to interview him on Thursday morning in connection with the murder in Brunton of Dominic O’Connor.’
‘That’s the man.’ The voice softened as they became two professionals in pursuit of a common enemy. ‘He committed a terrorist act in Manchester last night. His target had security cover – to whit, one man with a pistol acting as his bodyguard, who was at his side when he was shot. It’s touch and go, but apparently the odds are that the target will survive. Rather better odds than are being offered on Patrick Riordan, whom our man chased and severely wounded before making an arrest. Riordan is currently in Manchester Royal Infirmary, with bullet wounds in lung, chest and shoulder. It’s possible he won’t recover or won’t say anything, but apparently he’s mentioned your man Dominic O’Connor in his ramblings.’
‘Can we speak to him?’
‘We’ve bullied the medics into allowing us to see him for five minutes or so. I thought it might be worth your while joining our man, in case Riordan gives you anything useful before he pops his clogs. Best thing that can happen to the murderous sod, in my view. Three o’clock at Manchester Royal, if you can make it. Ask for Jefferson at reception.’
Scene of Crime and Forensics had not produced a great deal from the examination of the room at the back of his house where Dominic O’Connor had been found dead. The few alien fibres found on his clothing were either from his wife’s garments and thus hardly suspicious or from sources not identifiable. The two hairs which were neither his nor his wife’s might be useful if they provided a match with someone eventually arrested for his murder, but were as yet anonymous. The probability was that they would prove to have no connection with this crime.
There was one tangible and perhaps significant find. DCI Peach dispatched his wife to interview the probable owner of it. He thought it would be interesting to have a woman’s view on the person he had found to be the most enigmatic female involved in this multi-layered case. DS Lucy Peach took DC Brendan Murphy with her to interview Sarah O’Connor, the victim’s sister-in-law and former mistress, who was also the widow of his murdered elder brother.
Lucy had not seen the huge modern mansion where the widow of the elder O’Connor brother lived. She was surprised by her emotions as they drove up the drive and parked in the ample space by the front door. She had been involved for months in the investigation into the recruitment and abduction of care-home girls. She had questioned wretched teenagers about prostitution, rape and sadomasochism. Arrests had now been made and the local people who had driven and financed these vicious things were arrested and awaiting trial. But Lucy could not rid her brain of the thought that the money for this place had come at least partly from that awful trade.
It was possible, even probable, that the woman she was here to see had known nothing about the sources of the income which supported her luxurious lifestyle. Lucy watched the elegant, dark-haired woman closely as she ushered them into the huge sitting room. She looked too intelligent to have known nothing and suspected nothing about the darker areas of her husband’s business empire. Sarah O’Connor seemed to DS Peach like one of those women who took care not to know things which might embarrass her. She’d met a few such people in her years in CID and she didn’t like the breed.
But that was nothing to do with why she was here today, she told herself firmly. DC Murphy could do the talking; she’d listen, observe, and report back to Percy in due course.
Sarah O’Connor crossed her elegant ankles and said to Murphy, ‘I remember you, DC Murphy. You’re the man with the Irish name who’s never been to the emerald isle’
Only the English ever spoke of the emerald isle nowadays, Murphy thought waspishly. He repeated what he had said many times before, working hard not to sound irritated. ‘I’ve lived all my life in Lancashire. My grandmother was Irish, but I never knew her. I’ve never even been to Ireland, north or south.’
‘Nor had I, until I met Jim. I never quite felt at home there, when I visited with Jim. I don’t expect I shall go there much, once he’s been buried. There’ll be a lot of his old friends and rugby mates coming here from Ireland for the funeral.’ She looked round at the expensive furnishings and carpet, then out at the garden which stretched away below the long, low window. ‘There’s only me and my daughter here now and Clare’s away at university most of the time. Neither of us enjoys rattling around in a huge place like this. I shall move quite soon to something smaller.’
She’d already said that to Percy and Clyde Northcott on Tuesday, Lucy noted; she’d read the notes on that meeting before coming here today. The woman was nervous, despite her calm exterior and the cold dark eyes above the confident smile. Brendan Murphy said, ‘We’re here in connection with the death of Dominic O’Connor, not that of James.’
‘I guessed that. We all know how Jim died, don’t we? But I’ve accounted for all my dealings with Dominic. I haven’t anything else to tell you.’
Murphy didn’t comment on that. ‘Certain things were found at the scene of the crime. You are probably aware from your own experience that everything in the immediate vicinity of a suspicious death is examined very carefully. Anything which might have significance is taken to our forensic laboratories for detailed investigation.’
‘Of course I am aware of that. But you will have found nothing which will connect me with the death of Dominic. I’ve admitted that we had an association, but it was long over at the time of his death.’
‘You’ve also admitted to bitter resentment at the manner in which Dominic O’Connor ended your affair.’
Sarah glanced at Lucy. ‘I was as resentful as any woman would be who’s been ditched cruelly and unceremoniously in favour of a younger model. I then got over it and carried on with the rest of my life. I propose to continue doing that now.’
Murphy nodded and produced a polythene container which he held out a little awkwardly at arm’s length for inspection by the woman in the simple dark green dress. ‘Do you recognise this?’
Lisa lifted her hands automatically towards the object, then dropped them back heavily to her sides. It was a sapphire, set skilfully in gold. The very delicate gold chain which had carried it was broken, glittering like an accusation within the drab polythene.
There was panic suddenly on the face which had been so resolutely calm. ‘That pendant’s mine. Unless you’ve dug up one exactly the same to frame me.’
That suggestion sounded ridiculous even in her own ears and she wished she hadn’t made it. Now at last DS Peach spoke to her. ‘It’s yours, Mrs O’Connor. It was found in the room where Dominic O’Connor died, by the scene of crime team investigating his death. Can you account for its presence there?’
‘No. Perhaps it had been there for a long time.’
‘Does that really seem likely to you?’
‘No. I knew I’d lost it. Perhaps Dominic kept it.’
‘That doesn’t seem likely either, according to everything we’ve learned about him. The likeliest explanation is that you lost it last Friday night, when you were twisting a cable tight round that victim’s neck.’
‘I didn’t do that. I was nowhere in the vicinity of that house on F
riday night.’ Sarah looked from one to the other of her questioners, searching for some sign that they believed her.
She found nothing to comfort her in their impassive faces.
The big hospital in Manchester was busy; on a Saturday afternoon, many families visited patients, so that there were many rather subdued children in the corridors.
Peach met the tall, grey-haired man from the security services in the reception area as he had been directed. He had expected Jefferson to be a younger and fitter man, but it seemed the terrorist incident was serious enough to involve top brass rather than field operators. His rank was a help when they came to the room where Patrick Riordan had been isolated. Jefferson told the sister who came out to meet them that access to her patient had already been authorised, that state security and perhaps other lives in the future might be involved. The rather grim-faced medic didn’t go through the ritual of protest and the stuff about responsibility to patients which Percy usually met when he sought access to a villain.
The sister nodded acceptance and said merely, ‘Mr Riordan is very ill. I must ask you to conclude your business in no more than ten minutes.’
Peach grinned at the fresh-faced constable who sat on a chair outside the door. As a young copper, he had himself endured hours of boredom as sentinel to villains in hospital, all of them less interesting and lower profile than Patrick Riordan. Once inside the quiet room, they worked their way carefully to the bedside through the machine feeding the drip in the arm, the oxygen canister and the heart monitor. The figure beneath them might have been a corpse, for all the movement it evinced.
The older man, who had seemed so much in control, was suddenly diffident here. The nearness of death in the slight figure beneath the blankets brought its own uncertainties, perhaps even a reluctant respect. Jefferson spoke softly, addressing the shape twice as ‘Mr Riordan’. Receiving no reaction, he then glanced hopefully at DCI Peach.
Percy set his fingers upon the forearm which was, apart from the thin face, the only unbandaged flesh above the blankets. ‘You listening, Riordan?’
For a moment, it seemed that he had not been heard. Then the shape stirred fractionally. The eyelids flickered open in slow motion, as if a great effort was being forced into this tiny, instinctive movement. The head turned a fraction, the brown eyes gazed for what seemed a long time into the face of the man whose hand was still upon the sinewy forearm. The bloodless lips moved, framed words, said unexpectedly, ‘You’re Peach.’
‘I am. And you’re in trouble.’
The faintest of smiles moved the narrow mouth for a moment. They could scarcely catch his words as he said, ‘I shot the bastard. I shot that traitor, Seamus Fitzpatrick.’
Peach glanced at his companion and received a nod of assent from the older man. ‘You didn’t kill him, Pat. He’s going to recover. You might have made Jim Fitzpatrick into a hero.’
A frown furrowed the forehead for a few seconds, then cleared, as if even the energy involved in that was too much for the stricken figure beneath the sheets. The eyes which had shut opened again, looked for a moment at the ceiling, then swivelled painfully towards Peach’s face. ‘I’m dying.’
Peach’s fingers pressed a fraction harder on the cold skin of the forearm. ‘I think you probably are, Pat, yes.’
‘I did that other traitor, you know. I got Dominic O’Connor. He didn’t live.’
‘You’re confessing to murder. Be careful here, Riordan.’
‘I don’t need to be careful. I’m a soldier, an avenging soldier. I carried out my orders. Those who matter will remember me.’
For a brief moment, the vision of glory which had driven his life energised the mortally wounded man and his voice rose above the whisper they had strained to hear. But the effort exhausted his dying brain and he drifted again into unconsciousness.
Peach spoke to him twice more, shifted his fingers on the wrist to feel the pulse which still moved faintly there, then nodded to the blue-clad figure who had appeared in the doorway of the quiet room. ‘We’ve finished here, Sister.’
NINETEEN
Lucy Peach said to her husband, ‘I didn’t much like Sarah O’Connor. But for what it’s worth, I didn’t feel she was a murderer.’
Percy nodded. ‘We got a confession this afternoon. Patrick Riordan said in Manchester Royal Infirmary that he killed Dominic O’Connor, because he was a traitor to the republican cause.’
‘That lets her off the hook then.’
‘And Brian Jacobs and Jean Parker. And Ros O’Connor and John Alderson. Unless the confession was the last fling of a dying fanatic.’
As if to reinforce that idea, the phone rang two minutes later. Patrick Riordan had died twenty minutes earlier, at eight twenty on that Saturday night. Neither Lucy nor Percy spoke for a little while; they were silenced by the finality of death, despite their familiarity with it. Then Lucy said, ‘You’ll get your weekends back – be able to play golf again. You’ve had a busy time with these two murders. I expect Tommy Tucker will want to call a news conference to brag about his efficiency.’
Percy, who was gazing towards the glory of the clear western sky as the long May day died slowly, gave only an abstracted smile, even at the mention of Tucker. He watched purple infringing on crimson for another minute before he said quietly, ‘I don’t believe Patrick Riordan killed Dominic O’Connor.’
On Sunday morning he made a phone call and then collected DS Northcott. They had a brief discussion of tactics in the car, but otherwise little was said. The climax of an important case made even these experienced men a little nervous. You couldn’t afford to get things wrong now. If you did, lawyers would pounce gleefully upon your errors many months into the future.
The high detached house with its smooth red Accrington brick elevations had stood impressively on this high spot for well over a hundred years now. The metallic grey Ford Fiesta which the CID men recognised as belonging to John Alderson stood in front of the house. Northcott wondered as he parked beside it whether this tranquil, impressive residence had ever before witnessed either a homicide or the subsequent arrest of the murderer.
The first time they had come here, they had rung the bell repeatedly before moving to the rear of the house and discovering the body of Dominic O’Connor in his self-contained office. Now, on what would be their final visit, they heard the sound of movement in the house in response to Clyde’s first pressing of the bell.
Ros O’Connor seemed neither dismayed nor surprised to see them here at half past nine on a Sunday morning. She smiled up at Northcott. ‘I’d forgotten quite how tall you are. And handsome with it, too. But I expect the female officers make you well aware of that!’
Northcott gave her an embarrassed smile but no words. But she apparently didn’t expect any. She said cheerfully, ‘John’s here. He’s been here overnight. Well, we don’t need to make a secret of our relationship any more, do we? I’m planning to see Father Brice this week to discuss the details of our marriage. We shan’t do it for a few months, of course, and we shall have to explain that John’s been divorced from his first wife. But I don’t anticipate that being the difficulty it would once have been for Holy Mother Church!’
She had delivered all this by the time she had led them down the hall and into the high, square sitting room, where John Alderson rose to meet them. He looked as if he would like to tell Ros she was speaking too much, but he did not know how to do that in front of the two CID men.
Peach bided his time, waiting for the stream of words from this bright and brittle woman to cease before he spoke. She gave him his cue eventually. When they were all comfortably seated, she said breezily, ‘You must be here about Dominic’s death, I suppose. It’s impressive to see them working like this at weekends, isn’t it, John? Do you have some news for us?’
Peach watched her for a moment, like a man waiting for a roulette wheel to stop spinning, before he said, ‘A man confessed to the murder of your husband last night. He was a member of the provisi
onal IRA and he considered Mr O’Connor a traitor to the cause of Irish republicanism. Dominic was one of a list of targets Riordan was seeking to eliminate. On Friday night he shot and wounded another man on his list, James Fitzpatrick.’
‘I don’t know Mr Fitzpatrick.’
‘There is no reason why you should. He is a prominent Labour politician in Manchester. That is where Patrick Riordan shot him twice on Friday night in an assassination attempt. Riordan was pursued by the security services and was severely wounded himself. I spoke to him in hospital yesterday afternoon. He declared his responsibility for the death of Mr O’Connor. Patrick Riordan died at eight twenty last night.’
Ros O’Connor’s small, perfectly formed features looked as surprised and innocent as those of a kitten whose bed has suddenly disappeared. It was John Alderson who now spoke quickly, as if he feared what she might say if he waited for her to respond. ‘Then that surely concludes your case. It will be a relief to all of us to have it settled.’
Ros looked at him as if she had for a moment forgotten his presence. Then she turned brightly back to Peach and said, ‘Yes, that’s right, isn’t it? You must be very pleased about that. It’s good of you to come round here so early on a Sunday morning to give us the news.’
‘Except that it is hardly news at all, Mrs O’Connor. I don’t believe that Patrick Riordan killed Dominic O’Connor. I believe that he knew he was dying and that he was claiming what his fanatic’s mind considered the glory attached to this murder of a traitor to the republican cause.’
The silence which fell upon the room seemed profound, after the nervous torrent of Ros’s words before it. It was Alderson who said eventually, ‘Surely a confession is a confession? Unless you have strong reasons to think it false, you cannot simply choose to disregard it.’
