Nine Lives

by Kevin McManus

  “Don’t you manhandle me, young fella, if you know what’s good for you,” the small man shouted as he raised his fist.

  As he was talking, two uniformed officers approached from behind the small man and dragged him away as he threw punches and kicks into the air. Observing his treatment, the rest of the crowd quickly dispersed.

  Mulcahy sighed and walked back up the hill towards Inspector Harding, who was standing over the grave deep in thought. He was glad to discover that the corpse had been bagged. However, the rancid stench still polluted the air.

  “What do we know, Inspector, about the remains?” Mulcahy asked.

  Harding didn’t answer for a minute, still deep in thought. “Well it’s a woman, probably under thirty, but it’s hard to tell with the rate of decomposition. Long red hair, small build. We will know more when the body is examined. That’s it for now, do you fancy getting a sandwich and a bowl of soup, James, to warm us up? There is a good hotel in the village.”

  “Okay, sir,” Mulcahy replied although he had no appetite.

  Chapter 3: Walk the Line

  Monday 10th December, 1979

  Inspector Harding’s Office,

  New Grove Garda Station,

  County Galway

  Pascal Harding sat behind his desk in his small office cleaning the chamber of his pipe with a penknife. The office was tidy and organised, with a collection of files stacked neatly to his left. Over his head hung a painting of the inspector’s native Connemara. It was an image of a dark mountain upon which a low sky hovered. In the foreground a boat floated on a silver lake. Harding appeared to be oblivious to Jim Mulcahy who was sitting across from him.

  Jim Mulcahy stared at the painting as his superior went through his ritual. He knew that he had to be patient, that to disturb him would be a mistake. Mulcahy slipped into a daydream as he sank into the painting. However, he was pulled back to the here and now by the loud whacking of a pipe hitting off the desk surface before its contents were shaken into a bin next to his chair. Mulcahy took this as a cue to speak.

  “Inspector, I heard that you received a report from the post mortem on the body,” Mulcahy started.

  “Yes. Yes, I did,” Harding replied as he searched for a box of matches in a drawer.

  “So, what did it say?” Mulcahy asked.

  “What?” Harding replied harshly. “Have you matches, James?”

  “Yes, here,” Mulcahy said, taking a box out of his jacket pocket and handing them to Harding.

  The inspector cut a plug of tobacco and inserted it into the chamber. He struck a match and lit it and then sat back calmly in his chair and began to suck hard on the bit, placing the box of matches Mulcahy gave him into his grey cardigan pocket.

  “Yes, James, I received and read the report this morning. The corpse was a female, early to mid-twenties. Dead approximately six months. Her throat was slit with a long blade, possibly a kitchen knife or military knife. She bled to death from her injury.”

  Everything was always matter of fact and to the point about Pascal Harding. He had little time for diluting the information. He expected his men to operate in the same fashion.

  “Was there any identification on the body, a driving licence, do we know who she is?” Mulcahy asked.

  “No, no identification, all that was discovered was a bracelet, inscribed to Hazel from Paul, so we are assuming that her Christian name is Hazel. Unless, of course, she stole the bracelet. Or the murderer placed it on her wrist to confuse us,” Harding replied. “She was also wearing a green jumper and brown pants, so it matches the description of the missing girl.”

  “Hazel Devereaux,” Mulcahy interrupted.

  “Yes, it appears so.”

  “Hazel Devereaux was last seen alive on the morning of June third leaving the farm of Tom Fitzmaurice by Toms’ wife, Josephine. She was travelling in a car with Frank Rudden, who is also missing.”

  “Have you been doing your homework, James?” Harding asked with a smirk.

  “It seems very likely that it is Hazel Devereaux, she is the only missing female reported in the area,” Mulcahy replied.

  “Okay, we will have to confirm a hundred percent that it is her, but it seems very plausible. In the meantime, do some looking about, James. Take a drive into Blairstown, have a chat with the natives, see what you can discover. Don’t mention, of course, that this missing lady is the murder victim for now until we are definitely sure,” Harding said calmly.

  “Right, sir, I will get straight on to it,” Mulcahy said as he got up from his chair to exit the room.

  “Good man, James, keep me informed,” Harding said, taking a file from his desk and opening it.

  ***

  A half an hour later Mulcahy was navigating around the narrow roads of North County Galway. His brown Ford Cortina drove eagerly through the greying dark that hung around it as it vibrated through pot holed roads that twisted and slithered around bare winter ditches. The car radio was tuned into RTE Radio. The song ‘Video killed the radio star’ by the Buggles blared out through the speakers. The song ended with five minutes of adverts about all things of a festive nature that you just couldn’t live without. The DJ then announced that the next record coming right up was ‘When you’re in love with a beautiful woman.’ Mulcahy had enough at that point and reached over and clicked the radio off.

  “For fuck sake,” he swore as he wound down the window and tossed the cigarette he had finished out the window and then pushed a Johnny Cash cassette into the player.

  He arrived at a crossroads and studied the signs before pulling a ragged map out of the glove compartment. Two minutes later he took a right turn taking the road marked ‘Blairstown: two miles’.

  The village of Blairstown looked like a forgotten place, as if somehow time had passed it by. It stood amidst a forest that sheltered it from behind and at its approach flowed a brook that slithered slowly under a narrow stone bridge.

  A church sat reverently at its heart, adjacent to the home of the priest. Across from the graveyard carcasses of cars were scattered around the black and oil-soaked earth of an abandoned garage. Next to it, a weed covered wasteland engulfed two decaying homes.

  Across the road was the first of two pubs, Sean Grogan, publican and undertaker proudly inscribed on the filthy overhead sign. Further up the street were a grey National School building, a row of four houses and the second watering hole, Coughlan’s Lounge and Bar. Six silver beer barrels were lined up outside with two teenagers perched upon them dreaming of better days.

  Outside a small grocery shop, wilting cabbage heads piled over the side of damp cardboard boxes which balanced on Yellow Calor gas bottles. The shopkeeper stood at his door inspecting the street, looking at his watch, contemplating closing.

  A drunk crossed the main thoroughfare at a tangent. His head continued forward, but his legs had different plans. He cursed to himself with a pointing finger, trying to lecture his wayward legs to behave as he navigated the way home. A car stopped in the middle of the road and its young occupants mocked and jeered the staggering man.

  A child played on a battered black bike that had no brakes. He crashed into a wall to bring it to a stop. He looked around red faced and embarrassed, to see if anybody was watching.

  On a footpath outside the post office a black dog tore and bit at his fleas in the low winter evening sun, but a light rain was teasing, falling upon the dead brown leaves that congested the gutter. A faint breeze blew through the whining alder trees. Their sound seemed to hiss and sigh in the dying hours of twilight.

  But there's always a dark side to these places, dark windows with dirty grey net curtains stained with the dark red excrement of the house fly. Already, Mulcahy could observe the net moving and masked faces peering through them as they pondered who he was. The detective knew before he even opened his car door and put his foot upon the tarred surface of the road he was the topic of conversation across narrow kitchen tables. The shutters were already going up and it would
be hard for him to drag them down.

  ***

  Where to start first, the grocery shop owner would be as good a person as any, Mulcahy considered, or perhaps the regulars at the counter of the pub opposite. As he was making his mind up and surveying the street his decision was made for him.

  “How are ya, not a bad evenin’.”

  Mulcahy looked across the street in the direction of McDermott’s grocery shop.

  “Yes, it’s grand,” Mulcahy replied to the shop owner as he walked towards him.

  “I’m just closin’ up if you are looking for anything. Aren’t you one of the detectives who found the body of that woman over at Shanahan?”

  “You are very quick to observe that, can I ask your name, since you know so much about me,” Mulcahy asked sternly.

  “Brendan McDermott. Not much gets passed the people of this village. Is it that missing girl you found, Hazel Devereaux? The one from Dublin that was working in the fish plant out the road?”

  The small shopkeeper was over confident and brash, a tactic adopted to compensate for his small stature. Mulcahy watched the small man stand on his tiptoes in high platformed shoes, trying to reach his chin level. The young detective took an immediate dislike to him.

  “McDermott, you seem to know an awful lot, you must have your nose stuck in everybody’s business,” Mulcahy said with a sour taste in his mouth.

  The shopkeeper took the detective’s jibe as a compliment and smiled to himself.

  “I like to know what’s going on around the place, we don’t get too many strangers around here. We like to check them out, to know their background, who they are.”

  “So, tell me what you know about Hazel Devereaux then.”

  “Are you saying that it was her body that was found?”

  “I didn’t say that, just tell me what you know about her,” Mulcahy cut across him.

  “Hazel moved here around the start of the summer, back around May, she got a job with John Power, he owns the fish processing factory. She was a student. John always takes on a few students for the summer, cheap labour for him, the tight bastard. It’s normally local young ones he takes on for the summer work. We all thought it was a bit strange when Hazel and her friend Carol arrived in the village.”

  “Who was Carol, what was her full name?” Mulcahy interrupted.

  “Carol Walsh. That’s how Hazel got the job here, through her friend Carol. John Power knew Carol’s father. He owned some restaurants in Dublin that John supplied fish to. Hazel and Carol were students together at Trinity College. Carol’s father arranged for the two of them to get summer work here,” McDermott continued.

  “Not the nicest of jobs for two young ladies, gutting fish.”

  “No, it wasn’t,” McDermott said with a grin. “I think they were doing more office work, secretarial work. John always liked to have the pretty ones working next to him in the office.”

  “They must have found it dull around here, a change from Dublin,” Mulcahy said as he scanned the quiet street.

  “Ah now, they had a good enough time, a good active social life. They were into painting, they were kind of artists, hippies, you know the type. They were always outside the village taking photos or painting the scenery. I wouldn’t know much about that kind of thing.”

  “What part of Dublin was Hazel from?”

  “Oh, she was from a good area in the southside. I’m not sure exactly, but I heard her parents were loaded, I think her father was a doctor. She had a very grand accent anyway, well educated.”

  “You said that she had a good social life, how do you mean?”

  “I don’t have to spell it out for you, do I now. Two good looking young women come over here for the summer. Sure, the young fellas around here were flocking around them. Hazel and Carol would be in Grogan’s pub most nights. There was always singing and dancing going on in there. Late night drinking and parties afterwards.”

  “Do you know if she was going out with anybody from around here?”

  “Ah sure, there were quite a few, I heard,” McDermott said looking at the ground and grinning while he kicked a fag butt into the drain.

  “Can you name any of them?”

  “Well… I think I heard that Seamus Nealon’s young lad done a line with her, young Derek, and Padraig Kenny as well, I heard. Ah, there were a few others too. I’m not too sure.”

  Mulcahy took notes on a piece of paper as McDermott spoke.

  “Where did Hazel live around here, was she renting a place?”

  “Herself and Carol were renting an old cottage about a quarter of a mile outside the village. It belongs to Jack Coughlin, the publican down the street.”

  “Where would I find Derek Nealon or Padraig Kenny, the lads who went out with Hazel?”

  “That’s Padraig Kenny’s car outside Grogan’s, the blue Datsun. You’ll get him in there, he’s the barman.”

  “Right, Mr. McDermott, I’ll let you close up,” Mulcahy said as he put the pen and paper into his pocket and turned to head towards Grogan’s.

  “Let me know how you get on,” McDermott shouted after Mulcahy.

  Mulcahy turned his head to speak but changed his mind and carried on instead towards the pub. He stood for a moment and took note of the registration on the Datsun parked outside and then pushed the pub door to enter. The interior was large with brightly coloured papered walls. A pale grey carpet, littered with cigarette butts, covered the floor. Mulcahy’s nostrils flared from the repellent smell of stale beer wafting from the counter and toxic air exuding from the Gent’s toilet to his right. As he walked towards the centre of the bar he observed three men dressed in long overcoats sitting at the counter. A tall, strongly built man who Mulcahy gauged to be in his early thirties, stood with one hand on a draught tap as he nodded in agreement to a point being made by a barstool philosopher, while keeping one eye on the evening news on the TV on the shelf to his left. The barman switched his gaze towards the detective and watched him approach.

  “A pint?” the barman asked.

  “No, an orange juice,” Mulcahy responded gruffly.

  Having reached the age of thirty-two, Jim Mulcahy had avoided alcohol all his life. Watching his father drink away the best part of two farms of land and himself into an early grave had convinced him to stay clear of booze. He also had no tolerance for those who wasted their money and time in public houses.

  Mulcahy took a stool at the far end of the counter away from the three customers who were propping up the bar. A minute later the barman placed the bottle of orange juice and a smudge stained glass in front of him.

  “Can you change that glass?” Mulcahy ordered.

  “Why, what’s wrong with it?” the barman argued.

  “Why, are you blind, look at the filth on it, lipstick and God knows what else, looks like crisps, just change it for Christ’s sake will you?”

  “I can see feck all wrong with it,” the barman said as he reluctantly lifted the glass and replaced it with a slightly cleaner one.

  Still not happy the detective took out a handkerchief from his coat pocket and proceeded to clean the glass.

  “Are you working here long?” Mulcahy asked as he poured the juice into the glass.

  “A while,” the barman replied bluntly.

  “Is your name Padraig Kenny?”

  “You ask a lot of questions.”

  “I do, it’s my job, I’m Detective Jim Mulcahy,” he said as he took out his identification.

  “Oh, right. Yes, I’m Padraig Kenny.” The barman was taken aback and decided it probably was best to be cooperative.

  “I just want to ask you a few questions about the missing girl, Hazel Devereaux. I heard that you and she were… close.”

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “It seems to be public knowledge around the village that you and Hazel had a … fling,” Mulcahy responded as he sipped his orange juice.

  “That’s nonsense, just gossip, I’m a married man, Detective, a h
appily married man with three children,” Kenny replied quietly as he looked sideways to see if any of the customers at the end of the bar were listening.

  “So, it’s all nonsense, you didn’t go out with Hazel then. There must be something to the rumour, no smoke without fire and all that,” Mulcahy enquired.

  “Look, there was a party in the house she was staying at out the road on one Saturday night. I was at it, I don’t know why I went, I was like a grandad out there. The rest of them were young ones. I gave her a lift in my car because it was pissing rain that night. Some of the locals saw her getting into my car and they put two and two together, you know what they are like. Hazel was a beautiful looking young woman, what the feck would she see in a married man like me, there were loads of young lads chancing their arm, trying to get off with her,” Kenny replied.

  “She must have gone out with some of them, who did she go out with?”

  “Hazel had a boyfriend who came down from Dublin to see her every now and then.”

  “What was his name?”

  “No idea. he was a snotty kind of a lad, very full of himself.”

  “Could his name have been Paul?” Mulcahy asked, thinking of the name inscribed on the back of the bracelet found on Hazel’s body.

  “It could have been, I haven’t a clue,” Kenny replied shrugging his shoulders.

  “How about any local lads that she might have had a fling with, how about Derek Nealon?”

  “Derek, he could have gone out with her, he always has women on the go. A bit of a ladies man all right, he could well have,” Kenny replied grinning.

  “Anybody else you know of.”

  “I heard that Hazel had a night or two with John Power’s nephew, he was a manager in the fish processing factory where Hazel worked.”

  “Where could I find these lads, Derek Nealon and John Power’s nephew, what is his name?” Mulcahy asked taking out a pen and paper.

  “You will find Derek Nealon out at his homeplace, turn right at the bridge, it’s about the… fourth house on your left, a bungalow, a well-kept place, fancy gates. About a half a mile from here. John Power’s nephew is called Donal Keane, you won’t get him too handy, he moved to Boston back in the summer.”