The Child Before

by Michael Scanlon

  ‘Very well,’ Wilde said, looking about the room. It was a mixture of Cross Beg and district gardai. ‘Listen up people,’ he said, ‘thank you. The victim is Samantha Power, mid-twenties, exact age to be verified. From what we can tell, killed by a single deep laceration to the neck. Found this morning by a cyclist, Mr Maurice Crabby. Yes, of the supermarket. We believe she had her six-month-old baby daughter with her. Name, Róisín. The child appears to be missing. We are very concerned for her safety. A CRI alert has been issued within the past hour and a half.’

  ‘What’s a CRI alert, boss?’ The uniformed officer who’d asked was heavy set, with bushy white hair and red cheeks. He held a stubby finger in the air, peering over his half glasses. He could sniff retirement on the air, Beck felt certain, so didn’t care what people thought either of him or his questions.

  You’ve heard of it, you just didn’t listen.

  Superintendent Wilde ran through it quickly, added, ‘It’s already been disseminated through the media, Garda Kennedy. Motorway electronic signage too. And all ports and airports have been notified. Clear, Frank?’

  The older officer nodded once.

  ‘A mobile phone,’ Superintendent Wilde went on, ‘was recovered from the car. Initial analysis shows nothing unusual. A request through local media channels has been made for search volunteers, and Civil Defence are sending a coordinating officer. A dog unit is on the way too, also a request has been made to the Aer Corp for a helicopter… Inspector Beck.’

  Beck cleared his throat.

  ‘First off,’ Beck said. ‘We are also looking for a murder weapon, a great big bloody knife, in all probability. The water unit is on notice to attend if we can’t find it. A case number has been created on Pulse, and it’s very important that people use it because this will provide us with some joined up, strategic information. The case number is simple: 1-2-3-4. Everyone think they can remember it?’

  Beck fell silent. Heads nodded.

  ‘Suspects,’ Beck said. ‘We spoke to Mr Edward Roche.’

  A murmur went through the room.

  ‘The victim’s partner?’ someone asked.

  ‘That’s right,’ Beck said. ‘The victim’s partner.’

  ‘That’s where I’d be looking then,’ the same voice. ‘Definitely.’

  ‘He does fit the frame,’ Beck said. ‘Definitely. And we’ve taken a statement. Nothing more we can do with him for now, but we’ll keep an eye. Hourly patrols of Ravencourt’s estate, to be logged on Pulse under the case number, until we see how this pans out. We may need to request phone records too.’ He looked about the room. ‘Anyone know where Billy Hamilton is? We need to speak to him.’

  ‘I heard he’s in Glasgow,’ Frank said solemnly. ‘Supposedly. Don’t know where I heard that, but I did.’

  ‘Glasgow,’ Beck responded, surprised. ‘Like, as in permanently?’

  ‘No. A football game.’

  ‘Okay.’ There was exasperation in Beck’s tone. ‘You know where he lives in Cross Beg?’

  ‘Billy Hamilton?’ Frank gave a rumbling laugh, and a look, are you serious? ‘He sleeps in a different bed every night of the week, that man. He’s a stud.’

  ‘He’s a slut,’ a female voice offered. ‘If it’s good enough that a woman can be called that, then it’s good enough for that lowlife.’

  ‘That’s enough,’ Beck said. And to Frank. ‘Round you go then, and check, good man, all known addresses for Billy Hamilton.’

  Frank wasn’t laughing any more.

  ‘Moving on,’ Beck said. ‘What’s important now is that we gather as much CCTV as possible. The victim had groceries in her car, purchased from Crabby’s supermarket. That’ll be our first port of call.’

  ‘The man who found the body?’ someone put it as a question.

  ‘That’s correct,’ Beck replied. ‘Maurice Crabby knocked on my door this morning. He knows where I live, obviously. He’d forgotten his phone. He thought it quicker to come to my house than the station.’

  ‘Bit of a coincidence, don’t you think?’

  ‘Anything’s possible,’ Beck said. ‘At this stage. But it is the biggest supermarket in the town so I’m inclined to disagree, I don’t think it’s much of a coincidence.’

  Beck turned his attention to the small, stocky sergeant sitting near the top of the room.

  ‘Sergeant Connor?’

  Connor nodded. Beck knew he had only just returned to day shift following an extended period working nights. The collar of his shirt was tight around his bull neck, the veins inside prominent, and his chin extended from his face like an overhang. But he looked happy, like nothing could remove his sense of perpetual optimism now that he was working day shifts again.

  ‘CCTV, sergeant. If you can take charge. Everything you can get your hands on.’

  ‘Yes, boss.’

  Beck looked about the room.

  ‘Garda Jane Ryan?’

  ‘That’s me.’

  Garda Ryan stood. She had the harried look of one juggling too many balls in the air, and all at the same time. She looked uncomfortable, her uniform seemed too tight, and Beck wondered why she was wearing a hi-vis jacket on such a hot day.

  ‘When I had my third child,’ she said, ‘Samantha Power used to come and help me out with a few things.’

  ‘What kind of things?’ Beck asked.

  ‘You know. Bit of tidying, cooking, that sort of thing…’

  ‘You mean, like a housekeeper.’

  Garda Ryan shook her head.

  ‘I wouldn’t say that. Not a housekeeper. She just helped out, that’s all.’

  ‘What was she like?’ Wilde asked. ‘Can you tell us that?’

  ‘A grand girl. She was with us three months…’ She looked at Wilde. ‘Sir, do you mind if I sit down?’

  Wilde nodded. ‘Of course not.’

  ‘That was a year and a half ago now,’ Garda Ryan said, resuming her seat. ‘I haven’t seen her since.’

  She fell silent, folded her arms.

  ‘Where was she living back then, do you know?’ Wilde asked.

  ‘With her mother. I know because she didn’t have a car at the time. I had to collect her, drive her back home when she’d finished… By the way…’

  ‘Yes,’ it was Wilde.

  ‘Because I knew Samantha, I volunteered to go round to her mother’s place this morning. To inform her, see too if she had the baby. She didn’t of course. I had to call an ambulance because she fainted. Her brother was there, Mikey, lives in Australia. He’s home on holiday, has an attitude by the way. Oh, and baby Róisín, looks like she has a little birth mark, on one side of her forehead, a small red blemish, a strawberry birthmark, looks like to me. I got a photograph.’

  ‘Right, we need to get it to the press office ASAP. Anyone else? Father? Other siblings?’

  ‘There was another brother,’ Garda Ryan said. ‘Kevin, but he was killed in a motorcycle accident years ago. No one knows where the father is, she once told me he left when she was only a kid.’

  ‘Previous boyfriends,’ Beck said. ‘Would you know?’

  ‘Billy Hamilton, he’s the only one I know about, apart from Roche that is. But Hamilton was the one, definitely. I had to tell her to turn off her phone more than once because she was getting no work done, he was always ringing her. It caused a bit of a problem between us, so it did, she was besotted with him. Other than that she was a great girl, hard working. It was as if she was under his spell. He’s a bad egg, a hash and a piss-head too, but he looks good, I’ll grant you that. We all know him. And such a lovely girl’ She shook her head. ‘I could never understand it. I mean, the way she was drawn to him, and the other eejit, Roche, like a moth to the flame.’

  ‘When did Roche turn up?’ Beck asked.

  ‘He’s been with her since before the baby was born. They’d just moved in together. Roche has a job, so he offered her some type of stability, I suppose.’

  ‘You think Hamilton or Roche are capable of doing
this?’ he asked.

  ‘Complete morons, the two of them,’ Garda Ryan said.

  The room laughed softly, a release of tension.

  ‘But this. Are they capable of it? Of killing her?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Killing her is one thing. But the baby. Neither of them would touch the baby. Not even Roche. He was jealous of the child if you ask me. And yet if the baby was in the car, I don’t think either of them would have touched Samantha. But I don’t know. Hamilton has a temper, so he has. Who knows what he’s capable of. They both knocked her around. Ah, why did she put up with the likes of them? Bringing all that on herself.’ Garda Ryan shook her head.

  Damned if I know either, Beck thought. Damned if I know.

  Superintendent Wilde took a deep breath. They were seated in his office that looked like a set from a period drama. Beck noticed a wad of fifty-dollar notes on the desk top, wrapped in an elastic band.

  ‘They’ve just arrived,’ Wilde said.

  ‘What, those?’ Beck said, pointing to the money.

  ‘No. Forensics.’ He picked up the wad of notes. ‘Counterfeit fifty-dollar bills. They’re everywhere at the moment. Easier to forge than sterling or euro. People love to get them. Shopkeepers and publicans and the like. They put it in their going-to-America-on-holiday stash. The least of our worries, I think you’ll agree. Although finance up in HQ is like a dog with a bone about them. I’ve been getting some very sticky emails on the matter recently.’

  Beck nodded.

  ‘In this heat, there won’t be much left to work on if they don’t get started soon. Any word from Inspector O’Reilly, if I may ask?’

  The old window behind Wilde’s desk had been lowered and hung lopsided now. Beck could see the taut rope pulley to one side. The window was stuck.

  ‘You certainly may ask. No, is the answer. I haven’t heard from him. I’ve tried ringing, but there’s no reply. I’m getting a little worried, to tell the truth.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Because it’s not like him. Not at all. And his timing’s terrible. But he is a grown man, and grown men can act, shall I say, strange at times. You would know about that, Beck, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I would… but not him.’

  ‘Granted, not him. I’ll give it another hour or so, then send a car round to his house. In the meantime, I should go and talk to forensics.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘What do you mean, why? Are you serious?’

  ‘Is a hospital manager present during surgery?’ Beck asked. ‘No, is the answer. So, if you want to observe forensics at work, watch TV. You’ll be getting in the way otherwise.’

  Wilde narrowed his eyes.

  ‘Remember who you’re speaking to. You think I don’t know what I’m doing, is that it?

  Beck shook his head. ‘No…’ but he didn’t sound too convinced.

  ‘I can see why O’Reilly has a problem with you,’ Wilde said. ‘Let’s not fall out, Beck, okay. Anyway, I didn’t want you going to the scene, because I have something that requires urgent attention and I want you to look after it.’

  ‘Yes,’ Beck said, curious now.

  Superintendent Wilde turned to his computer, tapped the keyboard, clicked on the mouse, tapped on the keyboard again.

  ‘A recent arrival to Cross Beg,’ he said. ‘Residing at number four, Rafferty’s Flats. He’s on the sex offenders list, recently released on parole. He just passed his post-release supervision period and decided to move to the country, make a new start, where he doesn’t know anybody. The pervert is living here, Beck, in Cross Beg, and after what’s happened, we need to talk to him. Immediately. This man served fourteen years in Arbour Hill prison for the carnal knowledge of a minor. Abducted and raped an eleven-year-old girl in 2003, the dirty…’ Superintendent paused. He peered at the computer. ‘He reported his change of address within the mandatory seven days. Go and have a look. I think Samantha Power might be out of his age range. But the baby isn’t.’

  Beck leaned forward. There was something very familiar about what he had just heard.

  ‘Name?’ he asked.

  Superintendent Wilde peered at the computer screen again.

  ‘Jonathan Tiery…’

  ‘I know the bastard. I was the one who arrested him.’

  Twenty

  They pulled up outside Rafferty’s Flats. The sun was beating down now. The roadway was narrow and there was no footpath. In the centre was a patch of tarmac darker than that surrounding it which had melted. Claire tucked the Focus as close as possible to the warped railing at the front of the property. They got out and walked through the railing –there was no gate – and across a rectangle of concrete that had once been a small garden. They went up steps to the front door, the stub of a missing railing along the edge of each step embedded in the concrete. Next to the steps were three overflowing wheelie bins. The door was a faded blue with scuff marks along the bottom. On the wall next to it was a panel of doorbells, each bell with a space beside it meant to display the name of the tenant. But all the spaces were blank. The front door was not flush with the frame, and so not properly closed. Beck wiped the sweat from his forehead and pushed – and it opened. He stepped into a hallway, and Claire followed. The hallway was dark, clammy and hot, with a musty smell. A wide wooden staircase ran along the right wall and twisted upwards. The banister and spindles were ornate – at one time these would have been impressive, but now were faded and dusty. A large window high up in the wall by the stairs threw down some light, but a set of dirty half-closed heavy curtains blocked most of it. Another set of stairs to the left at the back of the hall led down into the basement.

  There was a white, heavy wood-panelled door to the left and another beside Beck on his right, but neither had a number. The doors were likely original Georgian, Beck thought. The whole place looked like it had come straight from the pages of a Charles Dickens novel.

  Beck went to the door to his right, was about to knock when the door opposite creaked open, just enough for a woman to put her head through, pale skin, black short hair, small facial features, surprisingly young. Surprisingly, because Beck thought everything to do with this house should be old. She looked at them without saying a word, then sniffed a couple of times. Beck looked at Claire, and slid his eyes sideways.

  Claire walked across to the door. ‘Flat four. Can you tell us where it is?’

  ‘You the cops?’ The woman’s voice was low, raspy.

  Claire nodded.

  ‘Number four. He lives right above me he does.’ The girl jerked her head upward. ‘You going to arrest him?’

  ‘Why do you ask that?’

  ‘No why,’ the woman said. ‘He’s an oddball. A header. Don’t like him. Makes me nervous every time I see him, he does.’ She began to close the door.

  ‘Is he home now?’ Claire asked.

  ‘He’s always home, so he is. You can hear him walkin’ around all hours.’ And the door closed.

  The stairs creaked like an old wooden ship. At the top, a hallway led to the left with three doors, identical to those downstairs, wood panelled, painted white. Beck knew the last door, at the front of the house, had to be number four.

  They went down the hall, stopped in front of the door. Beck gave three hard, business knocks. He put his ear to it, listening. He could hear a shuffling sound from the other side, followed by what sounded like newspapers rustling. Then, silence, a static silence. He waited. Nothing, just that static silence, like white noise. He took his ear from the door and knocked again, three more taps, louder, more insistent. He placed his ear to the door again. A creaking sound, right next to him: someone was standing on the other side of the door.

  Beck stepped back, mouthed to Claire, ‘Someone’s standing there,’ and, joining his index and middle fingers, raised and lowered them against his thumb in a speaking motion, mouthing, ‘Talk to him’.

  Claire spoke, her tone friendly. ‘Hello. Jonathan. This is the Gardai. Can we have a
word?’ No reply. ‘Jonathan, we know you’re in there. Can you open the door? Please?’

  They waited. Then, the sound of a latch sliding back, and the door knob began to turn. Finally, the door opened and Jonathan Tiery was standing before them. He’d changed, was Beck’s first thought. Gone was the mop of curly hair. Instead, his head was shaved, the shadow of a hairline visible along the sides way back on top. Beck thought: Why bother shaving your head if, according to what we’ve just been told, you don’t even bother going out? He’d lost weight too, but not in a good way, his cheeks were hollow and the shoulders bony beneath the round-neck jumper he wore even in this weather. His glasses were plastic rimmed and far too big for what was now a small head, and he looked pale and sick. Beck didn’t think he’d have the strength to cut a carrot.

  ‘You,’ he said, looking at Beck. Beck had forgotten how high-pitched his voice was, like a child’s.

  ‘Hello. Long time no see. Can we come in?’ Beck asked.

  Tiery grunted and turned, walked into the room. ‘Do I have a choice?’ he muttered.

  Beck and Claire followed. The room smelt of stale cooking oil. A bed took up one corner, next to it a sink and above it, a small circular mirror was fixed to the wall, its edges blackened with age. Across from the bed was a cooker and fridge and beside these a narrow, open, window. On the other side of the window was an old portable TV on a small shelf. In the centre of the room there was a narrow table with a cheap plastic floral design tablecloth, a red plastic chair on either side of it. Everything in the room was within a forward lean and an arm’s reach. Beck thought it could be a museum exhibit, titled ‘Bedsitting Room, early twenty-first century’.

  Tiery stood by the window, leaning against the wall. He looked at them, these people filling his tiny room. There was no expression on his face, nothing.

  As Beck watched this cold face, he was sent back to all those years ago.

  The girl ran along the crowded city street, screaming. No one came to help her, too shocked to know what to do. The girl was naked from the waist down, her blouse torn open, bright red blood splattered about the area between her legs. When the police were called, Beck was one of the two guards to respond, waiting for her at the top of the street. When she reached them he took off his jacket and wrapped it about her. She was only eleven. Eleven!