by Bateman
‘Well,’ he replied, ‘in a modern school yes, of course, but Saint Mary’s has such a long history. With a church school, the priest and nuns would have been living on site, so back then it was only natural for them to be buried there. As I understand it, when the new school was built in the 1960s, it was felt important to maintain the graveyard within the school grounds.’
‘How many graves are there?’
‘I’m not entirely sure.’
‘Simple enough to count the headstones, and from the photo, we can see perhaps twenty-five, would you agree?’
‘Ahm, yes, probably.’ Mr Quinn shifted in his seat. He said, ‘I don’t understand how this is relevant.’
‘It is relevant because this was never a public graveyard – it was not for parishioners but was reserved for the priests and nuns who served in the church or worked at the school. It is relevant because twenty-five into two hundred simply does not compute. For the maths to work, it would mean that for every year the church has been in existence, only point one-eighth of a body could have been buried.’
He said, ‘What?’
I looked to my audience. ‘Yes, indeed, one-eighth.’
From their lack of reaction, I quickly surmised that they had no idea what I was on about. So I clarified.
‘Mr Quinn, there aren’t enough bodies. I’ve been through the parish records. The school started small, but it built up quickly enough. Through all of those years there would have been many nuns teaching in the school, many priests, and this was in the days when life expectancy was low. There is no escaping the fact that there should be more graves. Many more.’
‘Well, I see what . . . but, of course, priests retire, nuns often go home to their families, they move parishes, they—’
‘And they are replaced. Mr Quinn, your school, your church – it’s missing some corpses.’
‘No, that’s imp—’
‘Not if you look at this.’ I pushed a button. It brought up a Google street map of St Mary’s. ‘This is the school with its grounds as it is today. This, on the other hand,’ I said, and pushed for the next picture, ‘is one from the 1960s, when the new school had just been constructed. Note the line along the edge of the graveyard and compare it with this,’ I brought up a third, ‘from around a hundred years ago, showing the church, a much smaller school and the original living accommodation, which has long since been demolished. Note this line along here,’ I said, approaching the wall and running my finger along the oldest of the images, ‘which shows what was the original wall surrounding the graveyard. If you use the scale, and you can take my word for this, it clearly demonstrates that the area covered by the graveyard in the 1960s is much smaller than that on the older map.’
‘I don’t quite understand what you’re getting at.’
‘What I’m getting at, Mr Quinn, what I can prove, in fact, is that at some point during the construction of what was then the new school, the old wall around the gravestones was knocked down, and when it was rebuilt, it was rebuilt in the wrong place. It left a number of the graves outside the wall.’
‘That’s just ridiculous!’
‘Mr Quinn, you told me yourself that the graveyard had fallen into disrepair, and we saw in the photo that even some of the comparatively recent gravestones have fallen over. You don’t think it’s possible that those much older graves, which perhaps only had simple markers, might have become overgrown, and then accidentally forgotten?’
‘Well, I suppose . . .’
‘My point being, Mr Quinn, that when Saint Mary’s chose to sell part of its grounds to the O’Dromodery Brothers, it did not realise that it was also passing on to them land which contained the remains of some of its former staff.’ I turned and looked directly at Sean O’Dromodery. ‘Remains which began turning up once ground was broken on the WestBel shopping centre.’
I moved from my position at the wall to stand before the last of the Karamazovs. The adrenaline was pumping. Free of my previous ailments, I was able to enjoy it without worrying about a stroke. I looked down at him, and he looked up, and neither of us blinked.
‘Remains which,’ I went on, ‘were their existence to become known, would not only lead to all building work being stopped, but might possibly threaten the entire project and conceivably lead to the collapse of your family business.’ I nodded at Sean, and then extended it to the entire audience, who were, I was gratified and encouraged to see, absolutely enthralled.
‘Yes, these skeletons could indeed have meant the end of the O’Dromodery Brothers’ business, a building company which was already facing extinction because of the recession. They had everything riding on WestBel, and now it was being thrown into very serious doubt by these dusty, broken bones. What were these tough builders, who dragged themselves up from the bogs of Donegal by their fingernails, who built their empire through their own blood and sweat and tears, going to do? Run to the planning authorities with what they had unearthed and beg not to be shut down? Just lie down and take it? Or were they going to hold on to their last great hope by whatever nefarious means they could?’
I jabbed a finger at Sean O’Dromodery. ‘In fact – by murder!’
47
‘That’s bollocks,’ said Sean O’Dromodery, before rejecting my invitation to sit in the witness chair. He glanced back at his security guards, and must have been contemplating having me thrown out, but then DI Robinson moved along the side wall towards the front, and stopped against it without actually saying anything. This reminder of his presence was enough for Sean to stay his hand; he must also have been aware that all eyes were upon him, and that that scrutiny demanded a defence other than ‘that’s bollocks’. But he was not about to wilt under the expectation. He said, ‘I invite you into my own house, on the day of my brother’s funeral, and you disrespect him, and my family and me?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘And I told you – you pays your money and you takes your chances.’ I was in a confident mood. I liked being off all my drugs.
‘If you – if any of you – think I’m somehow involved in murder, I . . . Christ, I’ve never heard of anything so ridiculous. Bones? Bodies? Show me them. Show me the evidence!’
I indicated the wall-screen. ‘I have.’
‘No, you’ve shown a few maps and photographs. Where are these bones? Show me the skeletons.’
‘Sean. Mr O’Dromodery. I don’t need to. It’s all there, it’s in the paperwork. It brought Al Capone down, and it’ll bring you down too.’
‘I’m not Al bloody Capone! Christ! What is this?’ He turned to DI Robinson. ‘You’re allowing this?’
DI Robinson gave a little shrug. ‘You have to admit,’ he said, ‘it is kind of interesting. Usually he throws out a lot of dots, and then you wait and see him pick a pattern out of them. Really, you should stick with it – he can be very entertaining.’
‘I don’t believe I’m hearing this. I don’t have to sit here and—’
‘Well, actually, you pretty much do,’ said DI Robinson. ‘Alternatively, you can sit with me down at the station, where the food isn’t as good and I can have you kept for as long as I want, what with all the murders we’re trying to clear off our books before the inspectors come in.’
‘Inspectors? What are you . . .?’
‘Oh yes, we’re going for one of those kitemark things – you know, to show we deliver a quality service? Bagging the likes of you would be the icing on the cake. So that’s your choice: deal with it here, see where it goes, or take a trip downtown with me.’
Sean sat back and folded his arms. ‘Right, fine,’ he hissed, ‘but I don’t get it. I just don’t get it. There is no fucking evidence. No bones!’
‘There is no other logical explanation,’ I said. ‘Between the numbers of staff that passed through Saint Mary’s and died in harness over the course of two hundred years and the number of graves, and the size of the current graveyard and the size of the original, one cannot draw any other conclusion.’ I decided to return to
my earlier analogy. ‘It’s like the once elusive Higgs bosun particle, Sean. Nobody has ever seen it, but still—’
‘What the hell are you talking about? Higgs who?’
I looked to my audience and found that most of them looked as confused as he did. I had failed to take into account the fact that the O’Dromoderys really had emerged from the Donegal boglands, and while they undoubtedly knew how to throw a building together, they had probably not been well educated, and the same probably went for many of their relatives and friends present in the room. It was a rare lapse on my part. But I persevered with the analogy by attempting to explain it. It was, after all, part of the reason for my presence on this planet to educate. Granted, this usually revolved around mystery fiction, but I was far from a one-trick pony.
I said, ‘Have you ever heard of the Large Hadron Collider?’
‘No,’ said Sean.
‘Anyone?’
A scattering of hands went up.
‘It’s in Switzerland,’ said one of the relatives.
‘Underground,’ said another. ‘It’s like a big tunnel. It goes round in a circle. They shoot things around it, really fast.’
‘Like Corgi Rockets?’ asked one.
‘You mean Hot Wheels,’ said another. ‘I don’t think they were made by Corgi . . .’
‘It was Mattel,’ I said, because I knew exactly what they were talking about. I had never been allowed toy cars or their race tracks, but at Christmas Mother would give me a wrapped Kays Catalogue so that I could at least look at the presents I wasn’t getting. ‘But more to the point, I’m actually referring to the world’s largest particle accelerator as built by the European Organisation for Nuclear Research. It allows physicists to test the predictions of different theories of particle physics and high-energy physics, and particularly to test for the existence of the hypothesised Higgs boson, the so-called God particle. The Higgs is a hypothetical elementary particle that is predicted to exist by the Standard Model of particle physics . . .’
I only stopped when I caught sight of Alison, back by the door, making a cutting motion across her throat, and Jeff, covering his face with his hands. I looked instead to DI Robinson.
He said, ‘Some bones would certainly help.’
I said, ‘There are no bones.’
‘Then stop this with this bullshit!’ Sean erupted.
‘No bones,’ I said, ‘but I do have a coffin.’
And that stopped him. I looked across the room to my trusted assistant, and said, ‘Jeff – bring forth the defixios.’
They were all craning their necks as I lined them up on a table which had previously held tea and coffee urns and which Alison and Jeff hurried to remove; I didn’t lend a hand because it was beneath me. Alison smoothed down the tablecloth and Jeff pulled the defixios one by one out of a Nike sports bag and set them down. I put three of them side by side, then the fourth a little to the right, leaving a space between it and the others. I then projected pre-loaded images of the tablets onto the wall. I stood back and gave my audience a little time to study the images and the inscriptions, and exchange whispered views with their nearest and dearest.
Then I said, ‘These, ladies and gentlemen, are what are known as defixios. They are curse tablets, and were once common in the Graeco-Roman world. Basically they ask the ancient gods to do harm to others. Each of these four defixios was discovered either at one of our murder scenes, or at a place where murder was intended. These first three were found at the homes of each of the O’Dromodery Brothers, including just outside this very house, though fortunately Sean is not yet dead. This fourth one was found at my own house, where I believe an attempt was made to murder me, though luckily only my girlfriend was in. The assassins were foiled by the intervention of Detective Inspector Robinson . . .’
I nodded my appreciation at him, and I kind of meant it. Before I could continue, Sonya Delaney said, ‘Was there not one for my Francis?’
‘No, Mrs Delaney. Nor was there one for Bobby Preston.’
‘What about my Sam?’ Gloria Mahood asked.
‘Well, as it happens . . .’ I picked out the All Star Health Club’s manager in the fourth row back. ‘Gary, did you bring the defixio you discovered after Fat Sam’s murder like I asked you?’
Gary Drennan nodded, and reached down to a Tesco bag at his feet. I waved him forward. As he approached I said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, if my theory is correct, this defixio will fit neatly into the gap I have left here for it.’
Gary handed me the bag and I carefully lifted out the fifth defixio and took it to the table, where I moved the other tablets slightly to make room for it.
‘You see that they fit together perfectly? This proves that they were cut from the same strip of lead.’
‘So what?’ Gloria asked. ‘What’s it got to do with my—?’
‘Mrs Mahood – Gloria – please note the length of the strip. Please note the shape. And finally please note . . .’ I moved back to the table and turned over the defixio that had come from the All Star; I pointed to the image on the wall ‘. . . this mark, and this number, engraved in very small numbers on the reverse.’
‘I still don’t get it.’
‘This strip formed an interior base to a coffin. Lead was used to stop the essence of a corpse leaking out through the wood both for spiritual and practical reasons. This is its maker’s mark, and this number identifies which undertaking establishment it was sold to. With this number, which Gary read to me last night over the phone . . .’
‘I didn’t know it was you,’ said Gary. ‘You said you were one of the directors of the club.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I lied. But there’s nothing wrong with lying in pursuit of the truth. So with this number I was able to track down the coffin’s manufacturer in England, which was and still is part of an undertaking business with several funeral homes across the country. They were able to tell me that this coffin was built in 1938 and sold in the following year for the transportation of an Irish priest who had been killed in a road accident while attending an ecclesiastical conference in Derby. We can see from this copy of the undertaker’s original invoice that it was paid for by Saint Mary’s Church and School in Belfast, for the burial of Patrick Duncan, who was, I understand . . .’
‘Father Duncan!’ Vice Principal Quinn suddenly piped up. ‘He was Headmaster before the war! His picture hangs in our reception!’
‘But he’s not in your graveyard as it currently stands?’
Quinn rubbed at his chin. ‘Do you know, I’ve been there quite a few years and I’ve never seen his grave. And yet, now that I think about it, he must have been buried there. I’ve seen photographs of the service in our archives.’
‘Which again suggests,’ I said, ‘that when the wall was rebuilt, he and many others found themselves on the wrong side of it, and more recently, part of the foundations of the WestBel.’ I turned to face Sean. ‘What do you say to that? Is that bollocks too?’
‘Yes, it still sounds like—’
‘And the fact that these defixios were cut from this coffin and inscribed with ancient curses suggests that someone on your side of the fence knew about its discovery. Someone who wouldn’t shut up about it and threatened to go to the authorities, so something had to be done about him – and who better to sort him out for good than your very own employee Fat Sam Mahood? What do you say to that, Sean? Is that bollocks too?’
‘Yes, it is.’
I laughed. A bit stagey, but apt.
‘You really don’t think this means anything?’
‘I really don’t.’ He stood up and looked around the mourners. ‘And I really think this has gone on long enough. My friends, I apologise for making you sit through this. I thought we were here not only to say a final farewell to my brother, but also to unmask whoever was trying to kill me. But so far all I’ve heard are some vague accusations against my late brothers and me which seem to be based on some frankly barking logic and even more dubious history. Wha
tever you may say, sir,’ he said, sticking a finger in my direction, ‘this is most certainly not what I’ve paid you for.’ He thumbed towards the door. ‘So I say to you, either shit or get off the pot.’
People can be very impatient. I had set this up in a particular way, but now he was threatening to drop the curtains and close the show before I was fully into the third act. But I was a showman, and the show had to go on even if it meant rewriting on the hoof. I let out a sigh and threw my hands up in mock exaggeration.
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘You want whoever is responsible for trying to kill you? And your brothers? Right now? On a plate? Okay, if it’s that important to you, have it your way.’ I spun to my left – I can do that, these days – and pointed along the front row. ‘Nicola Sheridan,’ I said, ‘j’accuse!’
48
Nicola did not seem unduly surprised by my accusation, which was in itself not a surprise. I knew her to be calculating, and quite the actress. She sat quite still, her eyes fixed on me, but unreadable, and then slowly she reached up and checked her green hat was sitting properly. She smoothed down the creases in her skirt, and then stood and crossed to the witness chair. She sat with her back straight and her thickset legs at a slight angle. It was, I thought, a confident pose, and I supposed that this meant that she had some surprise of her own up her sleeve. I observed that Sean O’Dromodery was trying to catch her eye. When he finally did he mouthed her name and then shook his head and looked at me.
‘Nicola,’ he began, ‘is . . .’
‘Overweight, yes,’ I said.
‘I didn’t mean . . .’
‘No, but we’re all thinking it: how could a big girl who hasn’t seen the top side of a vaulting horse for many a year possibly throw herself about sufficiently to stab one brother, throw another from a roof and rip the guts out of Fat Sam Mahood?’
I turned to Nicola. ‘Do you want to tell him or should I?’
‘Tell him what?’ Nicola asked. ‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about. The very notion of me killing anyone! I thought we were working together to try and clear this poor man’s name, but now suddenly you’re accusing me of murder.’
