‘Perhaps some of it, let us say,’ West said firmly, reaching the door and pushing it forward to step inside. ‘Is Mr Whelan here?’
‘In his office.’
West left Edwards to tell the youth that he’d be helping them with their enquires, while he, Baxter and Andrews went to break the bad news to Whelan.
He was seated behind his desk, the initial look of panic quickly covered by an ingratiating smile. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said, ‘what can I help you with today?’
When West handed him the warrant, he looked at it in horror. ‘I don’t understand,’ he said, his eyes skimming it, looking for a way out. There wasn’t one. Dobby could always be relied on to make sure warrants did exactly what they wanted.
‘We just need to look a bit deeper,’ West explained, ‘you can sit and read the papers and drink coffee, we shouldn’t be too long. It will help speed things along if we had your password for the computer.’
Whelan hesitated, his eyes flicking from one side to the other.
‘Your password, please,’ West asked again, his voice quiet but firm.
‘Outdoorsport,’ he said, ‘capital O, all one word, followed by an exclamation mark.’
Baxter nodded, and got to work on the company computer. Whelan hovered nearby, muttering to himself, until he was asked to wait with his staff at the front desk where Edwards had started downloading all the CCTV footage.
Ten minutes later, Baxter looked up from the computer. ‘Money-laundering,’ he said, nodding toward the screen. ‘Not a particularly sophisticated operation. They have a set of accounts for the auditor and Inland Revenue, and a second set that shows large amounts of money deposited at irregular intervals, which is then paid out as dividends at regular intervals.’ He chewed his lower lip for a moment, and tapped a few keys. ‘It’s not particularly sophisticated but it’s pretty lucrative. As a rough estimate, I’d say our pal, Whelan, is taking home fifty to sixty grand a year.’
Andrews whistled softly. ‘Not bad at all.’
‘Where’s the money coming from?’ West asked, peering over Baxter’s shoulder.
‘Some of the names receiving dividends are known to us,’ he said, pointing at the screen. ‘Mick Flannery, for instance, he’s got a history of drug dealing; and that one, Molly Davis, she used to run a brothel in Camden Street. Looks like she might have moved her business to Kilkenny.’
‘So Whelan is using this place to launder money for the scum of Kilkenny,’ Andrews said. ‘And I bet one of the names on that list is our friendly neighbourhood copper.’
‘If it proves to be, we’ll leave Internal Affairs to deal with him,’ West said quickly. There was nothing more demoralising for the gardai than to have one of their own go over to the other side. Internal Affairs could take that on board. He’d enough on his plate.
Whelan, to their surprise, merely shrugged when they told him they’d uncovered the scam. He asked to make one phone call and returned to his office to make it. They assumed it would be to a solicitor but it was, in fact, to the owner of the shop who arrived within half an hour, face pale and eyes on stalks.
‘I trusted you,’ Art Costello repeated, looking down on Whelan who sat, hands hanging between his knees, head bent. ‘And I paid you bloody well.’ He turned to the gardai who stood around the desk where Baxter still tapped away on the keyboard unperturbed. ‘Will we be closed down?’
West held his hands up. ‘Just temporarily, Mr Costello. We’ll take your computer away with us; it will allow the team to continue investigating. We’d also like to take all of the CCTV footage for the last year to assist us, both in this and in the case we originally came here to investigate.’
‘Yes, of course,’ Costello said, spreading his hands out to encompass the whole office, ‘take whatever you want, take everything.’ He turned and pointed at Whelan. ‘Especially that bastard.’
It didn’t take much longer to discover that the remainder of the staff were unaware of Whelan’s dealings. The acne-scarred youth who went by the name Buzz, looked at them in disbelief when asked if he knew. ‘He’s so strict, we couldn’t sell a knife to someone who was a day under eighteen. I can’t believe he did something illegal.’
Neither could the other two members of staff who were on duty. Whelan had managed to keep his shady doings well hidden.
They packed up the computer and took all the CCTV discs with them when they left an hour later. Costello, relieved to be told he could open the next day as normal had his staff carry the boxes out to their cars.
West and Andrews, anxious to follow up the footage of the cash-buyer took the discs, leaving the other two to take, not only the computer, but the grim-faced Whelan as well.
Back on the road, Andrews suggested stopping somewhere for lunch, blinking in surprise when West shook his head.
‘Not today, Peter, I’ve just got too much on.’
They still had to eat Andrews wanted to say, he had, in fact, opened his mouth to say it when he saw the set look on his partner’s face. Something was wrong. Narrowing his eyes, he looked at him for a few minutes, waiting for him to expand on the too much that he suddenly had on that prevented them eating. Something had happened since yesterday. That had to mean personal. Kelly. He sighed loudly. Since they’d met it had been one thing after the other.
‘Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?’ he said, when they’d travelled several miles in silence.
‘We’re no closer to solving Ollie Fearon’s murder or discovering who the child in the suitcase is,’ West said, his eyes fixed firmly on the road ahead.
‘So that’s a no then.’
West glanced over at his partner and then, seeing a slip road ahead, indicated and pulled in to it. He parked, undid his seat belt and turned to face him. ‘I need your help,’ he said, smiling when he saw the immediate nod. ‘You don’t know what it’s about yet.
Andrews shrugged one shoulder. ‘Tell me.’
West reached into his pocket and pulled out the envelope. ‘Get some gloves,’ he told Andrews nodding at the glove compartment.
He pulled a pair from his pocket instead and slipped them on before taking the envelope. Removing the three photographs carefully, he looked at them one after the other.
‘It’s not her,’ West said, hurriedly.
Holding each photo up to the light, Andrews nodded. ‘No, but they’re good.’ He put them back into the envelope and took off the gloves. ‘Was there a letter?’
West shook his head.
Andrews chewed on the corner of his mouth. ‘If this is blackmail, there will be. And maybe more photos.’ He looked at the sombre face of the man sitting beside him and shook his head. ‘You haven’t told her, have you?’
‘They only came this morning,’ West said, ‘but no, I won’t be telling her. She’s been through enough; the last thing she needs is this.’
‘But they’re not her, Mike,’ Andrews argued.
He ran a hand over his head. ‘She has a new agent, a guy called Owen Grady. She’s had a few meetings with him recently and do you know what my first thought was? That she was having an affair with him.’
‘But she’s not?’
West shook his head. ‘No, of course she’s not. But it worried me that I thought it.’
‘You take yourself way too seriously, you know that,’ Andrews said. ‘Stop wallowing in self-pity. Who sent them to you, and why?’
West felt some of the tension of the day leave him. He could always depend on Andrews to diffuse a bubble of self-pity. ‘I’ve no idea,’ he said.
‘There’ll be more.’
‘Undoubtedly,’ West agreed. ‘Someone went to a lot of trouble to do them. They have a reason; we just don’t know what it is yet.’ He started the car and pulled back onto the road.
Back in Foxrock, they sat in the Big One and started on the discs they’d brought back. Each disc was clearly marked with the date and time so it didn’t take long to locate their cash-buyer. But if they were hoping that having soun
d would make identifying the man easier they were doomed to disappointment. He spoke in a barely audible whisper forcing the assistant to repeat himself a number of times.
The one thing it did confirm was what they’d guessed from the earlier disc. Whisper or not, he asked for the Wild Ranger without hesitation.
‘He knew exactly what he wanted,’ Andrews said,
‘It doesn’t get us any closer, though, does it?’ West said, frustrated. ‘Get one of the lads to check out the two who bought the knives on-line.’
Andrews nodded. ‘I’ll chase contact details for the other three who bought in the shop. It’s best not to leap to any conclusions.’
West agreed but they both knew this cash-buyer was their man. ‘What about the CCTV footage from outside?’ he said suddenly, ‘we haven’t seen that.’ He reached into the box containing the discs. ‘If we’re really lucky, we might see his car.’
But they weren’t lucky. After a frustrating half-hour they managed to find a view of him entering and shortly afterward, leaving. If he’d driven to the shop, he’d parked elsewhere.
‘It was never going to be that easy,’ Andrews commented, taking the disc out and putting it back into its container. ‘I’ll keep these two and give the rest to Baxter. He can have a fun time looking through them all to see if there’s anything else of interest.’
West, leaving him to it, headed back to his office. At his desk, he put on some gloves and took out the photographs again. They’d used an image of her face from Facebook, he guessed. He was no expert, but he knew there were many ways of splicing photos together. There were, doubtless, hundreds of places where they’d got their hands on photos of women in such grotesquely lewd positions.
He put them back into the envelope. The next step would be to take them into the Fingerprint Office and ask one of the lads there to dust for prints but he couldn’t do it. The station was just too small.
Picking up the phone he dialled a number from memory. ‘Fiona,’ he said when it was answered, ‘I need a favour.’
The rain had stopped but surface water had the traffic moving slowly so it took over an hour to get to the forensics office in the Phoenix Park.
Fiona Wilson came as soon as she heard he was in the building. ‘You sounded so mysterious on the phone,’ she said with a smile. ‘So what’s so hush, hush?’
‘Can we go somewhere?’ he said with a glance toward the receptionist.
She looked surprised, her smile dimming slightly. ‘Of course,’ she said, placing a reassuring hand on his arm and directing him through the door. ‘We can use Steve’s office, he’s away.’
The office she took him to was small and cluttered. ‘Have a seat,’ she said, pointing to the only chair in the room while she perched on the desk, one elegant leg crossing the other. ‘So what’s the problem?’
It was easier to show rather than try to explain so he took out the envelope. She didn’t need to be told, she pulled a pair of gloves from a box that sat precariously on a mound of papers and took it from him
Her eyes widened as she looked at the photographs before throwing him a concerned look. ‘I recognise her, of course. She’s being blackmailed?’
He frowned. ‘It’s not her,’ he said sharply, and then held up his hands. ‘Sorry, I should have explained. These were sent to me. It’s not Kelly; someone has added her face to those...’ He waved his hands toward the photographs.
‘They were sent to you?’ She looked at him, weighing him up. ‘Why?’
‘No idea,’ he said, standing to pace the small room. ‘But someone went to some trouble to do this, they have a reason, I just don’t know what it is yet.’
She nodded. ‘There’ll be more.’
Everyone was an expert. ‘That was my thinking,’ he said.
She put the photographs back into the envelope. ‘I can see why you didn’t want to use the Fingerprint Office in Foxrock. Give me a few minutes, I’ll see what there is to find.’
He sat again and crossed his arms. There was a clock on the wall, its tick loud and annoying. After five minutes, he stood, took it off the wall, removed the batteries and put it back. He placed the two batteries in the middle of the desk where Stephen Doyle could find them when he got back. Maybe he found the tick soothing.
Restless, he took a book from the small, untidy bookshelf and spent several minutes reading about tissue degradation before closing it and returning it to its place on the shelf.
He’d just sat back into the chair when the door opened and she came in, a frown on her face.
‘Not good news, then?’
She shook her head and handed him the envelope. ‘Not a single print on any of the photographs. There are several smudged partial-prints on the envelope, none good enough for identification. Anyway, whoever took such good care with the photographs was unlikely to be foolish with the envelope.’
‘You checked inside the envelope?’ West asked and then shook his head in apology when he saw her eyebrow rise. ‘I’m sorry, of course you did.’
Relenting, she put a hand on his arm. ‘It doesn’t mean he won’t make a mistake next time, Mike. Come back to me if you get anything else.’
Thanking her, he made his farewells and headed back to Foxrock. He couldn’t spend any more time on it. Not until something else turned up.
Back in the station, he’d just sat behind his desk when Baxter appeared in the doorway. ‘I got contact details for the two on-line purchasers,’ he said, brushing ginger hair out of his eyes as he spoke. ‘One lives in Kerry, the other in Westmeath, and both were able to offer alibis for the night in question without hesitation.’ He dropped the pages he was holding and shrugged. ‘Both checked out.’
‘Thanks, Seamus,’ West said. ‘Did you check that the knives are still in their possession?’ He saw by the suddenly arrested look on his face that he hadn’t. ‘Just in case they were stolen, have gone missing, were loaned to a friend stroke ex-wife stroke lover.’ West grinned to lessen the implied criticism.
‘I’ll get back on to them,’ Baxter said, turning away.
By the end of the day, they’d managed to contact everyone who’d bought a Wild Ranger from Outdoor Sport. West stood among them in the main office and listened to what they had to say. Almost all had concrete alibis.
‘Barry Shelton, in Kilkenny, wants to know how he’s supposed to supply an alibi when he lives on his own and didn’t see anyone from leaving work the day before to going to work the next morning?’ Allen said, leaning back in his chair.
Andrews, perched on the side of his desk, asked, ‘Does he have a criminal history?’
Allen shook his head. ‘Not even a parking violation.’
‘Talk to his place of work, see if he was there until the end of the day and if he was there as usual the next morning, that’s the best we can do,’ West said. ‘Ok. We’ve eliminated the possible so we’re left with the one probable. Our cash buyer. We don’t have much to go on. Estimating his height from the CCTV, he’s about five ten, is of medium build, and Caucasian. That’s not going to get us far. I’ve sent the disc over to the IT department to see if they can do anything to sharpen up either the image or his voice, or hopefully, both.’
He saw the doubt in the four sets of eyes that stared back at him and smiled. ‘Yes, I know, it’s a long shot...’
‘A very long shot,’ Andrews interrupted.
‘Very, very,’ Edwards added.
West held both hands up in surrender. ‘Ok. A nigh impossibility but it’s all we’ve got.’
16
‘What are you going to do about those photographs?’ Andrews said before he left for home.
‘There’s nothing I can do at the moment,’ West said, throwing down the pen he was using and sitting back. ‘I took them to be tested for fingerprints. They’re clean.’ He saw a slight frown appear on his face and smiled. ‘No, I didn’t take them to the Fingerprint Office; I went across to the Park. Fiona Wilson had a look.’
The frown clear
ed. ‘That was a good idea. You two have become pretty pally, haven’t you?’
‘I like her,’ West said simply and left it at that.
Andrews, seeing he wasn’t going to get more, nodded and left.
West watched him go with narrowed eyes. A friendship between him and the attractive forensic scientist was always going to raise eyebrows, no matter how innocent it was. There were still men, Andrews being one of them, who didn’t believe in friendship between a man and a woman. He shook his head.
He’d planned to stay late and do paperwork, but being honest with himself; he was just putting off the inevitable. With a sigh, he took the photographs from his pocket and put them in his desk drawer without looking at them again. There was no point in worrying about them until the next step was taken.
One thing he was sure of, he was going to protect Kelly from any fall-out.
It was dark when he got home and he was surprised there were no lights on in the house. Kelly’s car was still parked where it had been this morning, so if she’d gone out, she hadn’t gone far. Maybe to the local shops, he thought, putting his key in the lock and pushing the door open.
It was dark in the hallway but he didn’t switch on the light. Sometimes, he found the darkness soothing after a day under the glare of the neon lights in the office. He hung his raincoat on the newel, dropped his keys into the hall table drawer and headed to the kitchen. Tyler didn’t come rushing over, so she must have fed him before she went out. Relaxing, he opened the fridge, flooding the room with light, and took out a beer. He was momentarily blinded when he closed the door, finally giving in and switching on a light.
He was disappointed to see no evidence of anything cooking. His belly rumbled in sympathy and he had a sudden regret that he hadn’t agreed to stop for lunch with Andrews. He’d had no breakfast either. So apart from numerous mugs of coffee, he’d had nothing to eat all day. He shook his head. No wonder he didn’t feel too great.
The beer wasn’t the best idea, but he poured it into a glass anyway then opened the cupboard to search for something to eat. A jar of olives and a packet of crackers. Things were looking up. Opening the fridge again, he found some cheese that had gone a little hard around the edges. Humming, he took out a plate, opened the crackers and the olives and minutes later was balancing the plate and his beer to open the door into the lounge. He’d watch the news, he decided. When Kelly came home, they could go out for something to eat or get a take-away.
Death in Foxrock (A Garda West Crime novel Book 4) Page 12
