Crossing The Line

by Catriona King

  Liam conceded the point.

  “Do you want to go back in?”

  Craig shook his head and moved closer to the slightly open office door, leaning in to listen. They were treated to Tommy giving a eulogy to Derek Smyth that made the man sound like a national treasure, and then berating McCrae for not taking better care of his men, as if they were all little kids. After five minutes of that, peppered with invective, the original UKUF boss paused long enough for his successor to squeak,

  “But wat cud I huv dun, Tommy? Decker wuz inside.”

  There came a lecture about safety in numbers and how any other UKUF members inside Mahon should have rallied around to protect their man. Craig decided that he’d heard enough. He needed to look into Rory McCrae’s eyes.

  He pushed open the door and watched the performance for a few seconds longer then he nodded Liam to take Tommy out.

  “McCrae and I need a few words alone.”

  Shutting out the inevitable noisy objections from the older Loyalist Craig half-closed the door behind them, all the way being too much given the pungency of his successor’s aftershave.

  He waved Rory McCrae back to his seat.

  “OK, McCrae. You obviously already knew that Derek Smyth was dead. How and when?”

  The Loyalist attempted to reassert his dominion by taking his time answering and straightening up both his clothing and chair. A cough from Craig said that his time was up but McCrae obfuscated further anyway, this time by talking around the event.

  “Decker died on Sunday, I heered.”

  Craig began a mental count to ten, trying for patience. It had only reached four when his next words snapped out.

  “That’s not what I meant! But while we’re on the subject, who did you hear it from?”

  “Gassip.”

  “Gossip it may have been but it travelled here from Armagh somehow.”

  The UKUF heir made a show of trying to remember, which, oddly, involved tapping a finger against his pouted lips self-consciously, as if he’d seen a similar technique employed elsewhere, probably on TV.

  “Oh, aye...now I remember. I gat a phone call.”

  “From?”

  “Wan af my other lads inside. I dunt remember his name. It wuz on Sunday afternoon after they seen ye pigs come an’ go.”

  Craig wasn’t sure that he believed in the mysterious caller but he moved on: if the exchange had actually happened then Davy would be able to pull the call from Mahon’s logs.

  “How many men do you have inside Mahon right now?”

  In a model of management efficiency the answer came snapping back.

  “Four, well three now Decker’s ded.”

  “Do they mix with the others in there?”

  McCrae’s small eyes narrowed to slits, interestingly as far as Craig was concerned; it meant something but he didn’t yet know what.

  “They pass themselves, if that’s wat ye mean.”

  ‘Passing oneself’ meant to be civil or polite in Irish parlance, but that hadn’t been Craig’s point. He suddenly realised that he had his answer to McCrae’s narrowed gaze.

  “I meant do the gangs all hang around together?”

  To admit that UKUF constituted a gang was to admit by association that it was a criminal organisation, something that since Tommy’s retirement McCrae had always tried hard to deny, insisting that UKUF was now a ‘community group’. It was a statement that had made even hardened politicians laugh, although it hadn’t prevented some on the unionist side from awarding them ‘development’ funds.

  A momentary show of innocence from the Loyalist was challenged by a scowl from his interviewer that said his patience was wearing thin. It led to McCrae’s shrugged acceptance that the term gang might possibly apply, then UKUF’s exclusivity was emphasised by the paramilitary leaning forward on his desk and replying to Craig’s question in a growling tone.

  “My men might say hiya, but beyond that they keep themselves to themselves. UKUF doesn’t melt with no other gang. Nat out here and nat inside.”

  Craig came back quickly, pressing the point. “Not even other Loyalist gangs?”

  It produced exactly the reaction that he’d hoped for.

  “Especially nat those scrotes! I’d rather they mixed with Fenians than that bunch from the Shankill or Ligoniel. Those fuckers wud sell their granny fer a Pernod an’ Coke!”

  Craig had just heard it straight from the horse’s mouth; UKUF was a gang and McCrae had known that Derek Smyth was dead on Sunday, perhaps even before the call that he’d said he’d received. Plus, he didn’t allow his men to mix with other Loyalist gangs inside prison, preferring even Catholics to them. Craig wasn’t sure what the information meant for their case yet, but it was definitely something important.

  He rose sharply to his feet, taking his host by surprise.

  “That will be all for now, Mister McCrae.”

  Ignoring the shock on the paramilitary’s face Craig yanked open the door, and a furious Tommy, resentful at being kept out of UKUF business, preceded an amused looking Liam through it like a shot from a gun.

  “We’re leaving now, Tommy. Would you like a lift anywhere?”

  The answer came in the form of a chair being noisily dragged across to the desk and Tommy thudding down hard on it.

  “Nah. Me an’ McCrae need a little chat.”

  Whether that chat would involve a toilet bowl the detectives didn’t hang around to find out.

  ****

  Mahon Prison. The Recreation Yard.

  There had been a lot of talk about how Derek ‘Decker’ Smyth had croaked it, met his maker or returned to the universe, depending on which school of philosophy you came from, but the one thing that couldn’t be disputed was that the UKUF lieutenant was dead and that was focusing some people’s minds. One of those people was Jimmy Morris, sarcastically nicknamed ‘Joyboy’ because of his almost permanently doleful expression, the inmate who had made the Sunday phone-call to Rory McCrae.

  Part of his focus was on the practicalities of Smyth’s demise. Not the whole, “How do we get his skinny ass out of here before he starts to stink?” thing, although even in a prison where less than fragrant and unnamed odours regularly permeated the corridors the smell of a rotting body might have caused a few complaints. But no, the logistics of all that had been dealt with by the governor and his lackeys, and a few other geeks who’d appeared and disappeared before ‘Smyth the Stiff’ had been carted off, some of them looking worryingly like cops. And yes, Morris knew that shouldn’t have worried him, but it did. Decker had been alone in a locked cell, so why hadn’t his death been treated as natural causes like it should have been, instead of calling in the cops? Cops had a nasty habit of poking their noses in where they weren’t wanted, and there were things inside that cell he didn’t want found by anyone but him.

  The muscular convict shuddered at the possibility and then leaned against the back wall of the rec yard, removing a roll-up from behind his ear and lighting its tip. A few long drags and a fug of smoke later he had retraced his thoughts and arrived back at Smyth’s cell and the cops.

  The problem was the place was sealed off now so he couldn’t just nip in to check that things were clear. Now normally breaking and entering would have been a stroll for him, he’d been doing houses since he was twelve and had almost never got caught; but this particular residence wasn’t just sealed with a simple Yale lock that he could pop, and it didn’t have an access window to break. There was only one way in and out of the cell and it was bound up tighter than the governor’s ass with police tape, and in the absence of some of his own to replace it with any breach would be noticed PDQ, even if they hadn’t posted awarder outside the door around the clock.

  Derek Smyth’s one-time deputy took another drag on his skinny cigarette and shook his head, exasperated. It wasn’t even as if he had an excuse for going in like, “Oh, sorry, I need to get back a book I lent Decker. I took out from the library last week and now they say it’s overdu
e.” Like was the librarian going to do about it? Fine him? Good luck with that; they’d be docking it from his kitchen worker’s pay for years. And why the hell would a prison guard care if he got in trouble anyway, or even believe him? If there was one thing about those lads, even the nicest of them, they knew that they were guarding cons, and cons tended to lie.

  Morris dropped his cigarette butt to the ground and extinguished it with his heel, then he gazed up at the winter clouds and went around his mental loop again. He’d been Decker Smyth’s UKUF deputy outside and now inside prison for two years, both of them joining the gang from other Loyalist groups at around the same time. He’d known pretty much everything that the man had got up to, so what he needed to do now was think. Think, man. Could the cops have found anything in Decker’s gaff to point them to the reason why he’d been knocked off?

  He furrowed his forehead until it corrugated, making a virtual tour of Smyth’s cell and a mental list as he did. Bed nothing. Floor nothing. Bog nothing, sink nothing; Decker wouldn’t have been thick enough to hide anything inside the cistern; they’d all watched prison escape movies and they all knew the flaws.

  He moved his virtual scan upwards: ceiling nothing, windows nothing; too bloody visible. That only left the walls. Jimmy Morris froze mentally and physically as he landed on the vent and the calendar. Damn. More damn for the first than for the second; the odds of the cops even having noticed the wall chart were slim, and of them understanding what they were looking at even slimmer. The screws had never twigged what it was and they’d searched the cell every fortnight for a year. And everyone knew that cops were thicker than shit. If they weren’t then their clear-up rate would be a whole lot higher than it was.

  That just left the vent, and as he pictured the small wall recess and the metal grille that covered it he gave a noisy groan. It brought footsteps clattering towards him, and by the time Jimmy Morris had opened his eyes to see who’d joined him, Prison Officer Brian Archibold was in his face. The affable new guard was already well liked by the inmates so Morris knew that it could have been a hell of a lot worse.

  “All right, Joyboy?”

  The Loyalist pushed himself off the wall and stood up straight as a mark of respect. Not because he actually did respect Archibold, although he was OK as screws went, but on the whole he’d like to see the lot of them at the bottom of Lough Neagh. No, Joyboy Morris stood erect because as a rule he found it easier to tell lies when he was vertical; if he’d been asked why he couldn’t have answered but he’d been that way since he was a boy, and he was pretty sure that a lie would be in order soon.

  “Awl right, boss. Just havin’ a cig. Ye know.”

  Archibold smiled and nodded conspiratorially. “I smoke sometimes but my wife doesn’t know, so I sneak out to the garden when she’s asleep.”

  They fell into silence for a moment, Morris well aware that any enquires about Mrs Archibold, no matter how innocuous, were off limits, and Archibold looking as if he thought he had already said too much.

  After a moment the guard spoke again.

  “You were standing with your eyes shut, like you were in pain. Then you groaned. That’s why I came across.”

  Damn. There was nothing worse than a sympathetic screw.

  Morris rushed out an explanation. “Not in pain, boss, worried. Just wondering what to do when I get out.”

  As if. The moment he was released he’d go straight back to McCrae at the bookies and jockey for Decker’s lieutenant’s post; but it was the only fiction that he could think of quickly and for now it seemed to have worked.

  Archibold nodded in solidarity.

  “When’s your leaving date?”

  “End of next year, if I don’t make it earlier on parole.”

  “You’re doing a computer qualification, aren’t you?”

  “Aye, and car mechanic-ing too. I’m speeding them up too so I can get my certs before my parole board in Feb. Just in case they say I can go home early.”

  The guard smiled cheerfully. “Well, there you go then. If you leave here with skills you’ll find a job within a week.”

  He’d find a job all right, but it would be skimming cars or hacking bank accounts for McCrae.

  The prisoner nodded in what he hoped looked like gratitude.

  “You’re right, boss. Thanks for that.”

  With his pat on the head for being a good little officer supposedly pleasing him, Archibold waved and turned away, leaving his charge to return to his mental tour of Derek Smyth’s cell and mourn the SIM card and drugs that would most probably have been inside the vent, both now likely in the cops sweaty little hands.

  But if Joyboy had been able to see Brian Archibold’s expression rather than merely imagining it he would have seen suspicion there not pleasure, and perhaps even guessed that the guard was heading off to make a report, although he would never have suspected that it was going to be to someone far from Mahon’s walls.

  Chapter Seven

  The C.C.U. Murder Squad. 12.30 p.m.

  By the time Craig and Liam arrived back at the office Andy White had established a court, with eager acolytes surrounding him and tending to his every need. Annette had placed a cup of coffee and some biscuits at his elbow, and Andy, Aidan and Ryan, now communally christened AAR, said in a country yokel’s accent, all other possible arrangements of their initials sounding too contentious in their little country, had arranged themselves in a horseshoe of seats around the visiting D.C.S. and were encouraging him to tell tales.

  The reason that AAR were there to listen was that they’d had their plans altered by discovering that Felicity Kehoe was in a meeting until two-thirty, and so had re-jigged their schedule to: casino, office, Cookstown at three and then back for the briefing at six. So there they were, worshipping at the feet of a legend, Andy White being the man who’d mopped up most of the drug-dealers in Derry City within a year of arriving there. He was also a legend because of his blue shirts, but that was more because they made people laugh.

  Craig and Liam stood at the entrance to the squad-room and watched for a moment before joining the group, Liam more than a little put-out that Annette was bringing the Drugs officer tea when she never did that for him. They might have watched for longer had not the legend spotted them and jumped to his feet with, “It’s the lads, hey”, the customary ‘hey’ added at the end of most of his sentences and sometimes even in the middle of one a colloquialism from Derry and the area around.

  Liam was more interested in food than backslapping, not having eaten since a sausage roll he’d grabbed at a garage two hours before.

  “Here, Annette, where’s my tea?”

  “In Sri Lanka still waiting to be picked.”

  Craig cut the discussion short by opening the door of his office and waving his deputy and the D.C.S. in, galvanising everyone else present with a brisk, “I’ll be doing a ten minute roundup before we head to Armagh, so have anything important ready to report when we come out.”

  When the door had closed had behind them, he started the meeting like a dinner party host.

  “Lovely to see you, Andy. How does it feel being back in the big smoke?”

  The Derry D.C.S. smiled, knowing that it was a deliberate jibe.

  “I think you’ll find that honour belongs to Derry now, hey. It’s all going on west of the Bann.”

  Liam concurred. “You’re not wrong there. That Derry Girls show on TV is brilliant craic.”

  “And our Halloween parade, and the new medical school that’s coming, and the-”

  Craig waved him down, and not only because they had work to get on with; he was a Belfast boy and loyal to his capital.

  “Tourist blurb aside, well done on the drugs clean-up, Andy.”

  A red blush above the D.C.S.’ sky-blue shirt threw his eyes into even brighter relief.

  “Ach, it was nothing, hey. The dealers up home are wild thick, so a child could have caught them.”

  “Well, no-one had managed it before you,
so you obviously did something right.”

  A knock on the door and a tray of refreshments interrupted Craig for a moment, but he carried on as everyone helped themselves to some food.

  “As you know, Andy, we’ve had a death in prison, and we know drugs were involved so in the new SOC arrangement Flanagan wants us to work together to sort it out.”

  The Derry D.C.S. helped himself to a sandwich and chewed on it thoughtfully for a moment before responding.

  “OK, so you’re sorting the actual murder, but the drugs are the part we need to work together on, hey. Tell me about them.”

  Craig turned to his deputy just as he was about to lift his third biscuit. “Bring Andy up to date on the tablets we found, please, Liam.”

  The D.C.I. set down his cup and folded his arms, summarising pithily.

  “A UKUF scrote called Derek Smyth kicked the bucket because he took a poison laced pill.”

  Andy frowned. “What sort?”

  “Don’t know what the poison was yet, we’re still waiting for Des to come back on that, but the outer shell was a mix of diazepam and bicarb.” He sat forward, suddenly enthused. “It was bloody clever actually. They made the outside in halves, hollowed out the centres and lined them with gelatine, put in the liquid poison and then sealed them together all round. It was like something out of a Bond movie.”

  Andy’s eyes almost popped out.“Gelatine? You’re kidding me.”

  “Nope, and you’ll know when I’m kidding because I’ll say ‘boom boom’.”

  Craig set down his coffee and joined in. “Liam’s right, Andy, that’s exactly what we found. And there are implications here beyond just this death.”

  The visitor nodded his head furiously. “Damn right there are, hey. If someone’s perfected a two drug delivery system the potential is endless. The combinations will be unlimited and there’ll be a fortune to be made on the street, and even more so in high-end clubs, hey. There are people with money in those places who’ll pay anything to get high.”

  Liam had returned to the biscuits and continued the discussion with one in his mouth. “The thing is...” crunch, “making these things...” crunch, “requires special equipment and-”