MOLLOY MOTIONED FOR me to stay back with Fred, and I did so, holding tightly to the dog’s collar while Molloy made his way cautiously inside. A few minutes later, he reappeared in the doorway.
“There’s no one here.”
“Can I have a look?”
“No – you stay here. I think this place may be connected with what happened to Carole.”
“Why? What have you found?”
“Just wait here, will you? And tie him up in case he follows me in.”
I put Fred’s lead back on and tied him to one of the trees, ignoring his reproachful look, while Molloy went back into the cottage. I peered after him into the tiny hallway, careful not to put my feet inside. From the little I could see, it was clear that cold and damp had taken its toll on the place: wallpaper hung in strips off the walls and old brown linoleum bubbled on the floor. There was a smell of mold and old turf fire.
There were three doors leading off the hall. Molloy disappeared through the first. Frustrated, I walked around the perimeter of the house, peering in through the windows. The first was covered on the inside with cheap adhesive plastic. I guessed it must be the bathroom. There was a section at the bottom where the adhesive had come away, and I looked in to see an old pink toilet, washbasin and bath, all equally stained. There was rubble on the floor.
I moved to the next window, which looked on what must originally have been a bedroom, though there was no bed from what I could see. Instead, I saw a pink dresser and two armchairs. The chairs were covered in a filthy patterned fabric with tears from which brown horsehair sprouted. There was a picture on the wall – a framed picture of the Madonna and child – tilted to one side. A grubby lace curtain hung from the lower half of the window.
I moved to the other side of the house, to what had once been a kitchen. A beige solid-fuel cooker dominated the room, with black scorch marks around the oven and grate, a flue pipe disappearing into the wall. A huge old kettle rested on one of the rings, rusted and blackened. The walls had the same peeling, mildewed wallpaper as the hall, and the floors the same brown linoleum, a half-moon-shaped burn beneath the cooker. A second religious picture hung to the right, obscured partly by what looked like a washing line. Something was hanging from the line, and I rubbed the glass to get a clearer view. Two items, brown and beige, soft-looking like animal skin. A pair of boots, facing one another, toes touching. I recalled Carole’s poor cold feet and I could hear my own breath.
A face appeared at the window and I nearly jumped out of my skin. It was Molloy. He came outside.
“Were those Carole’s boots?” I asked. “It certainly looks like it.”
I shuddered. There was something unforgivably cruel about leaving the woman barefoot to the elements, while her boots were left in this mocking pigeon-toed display.
I was almost too afraid to ask. “What else did you see in there?”
Molloy hesitated. “I think the cooker has been recently lit; there’s a smell of smoke in the kitchen but I don’t want to look inside the grate until the crime-scene lads get here. There’s no other sign of occupation that I can see.”
I stared at the house. It made me shiver. “What a creepy place.”
“Yes,” Molloy agreed.
“I wouldn’t fancy having to spend a night here. Do you think Carole did?”
“It’s possible.”
Fred barked suddenly, frustrated at being left out of things.
“Anyway,” Molloy said. “Let’s get ourselves out of here. It may very well be a crime scene.”
Once out of the trees, Molloy made another call, this time to give directions to the cottage. When he’d finished, he turned to me. “Right, they’re with the body, securing the scene. Now you really do have to get out of here and let the authorities do their job.”
This time I didn’t argue. The cottage and the little wood had given me the creeps. Molloy walked me back to where we had found Carole. The place was swarming with people, the area cordoned off and a white tent erected over the body. McFadden was deep in conversation with a guard I didn’t know. Molloy approached them and came back with McFadden. His face was grim.
“Andy is going to take you back to Malin. I need to go and see George Harkin.”
I nodded. I didn’t envy him his task.
“Don’t say anything to Phyllis,” he added. “At least until I’ve told George. I’ll text you.”
Saying nothing to Phyllis wasn’t easy. She knew the instant I appeared at her door that something was up, although I did provide her with some hefty clues, returning without Molloy and with a pallor she could tell wasn’t solely because of the cold. Fred was a mess too, his legs and front wet with mud and his coat strewn with pine needles.
The scent of mulled wine hit me as soon as we climbed the stairs, and Phyllis shoved an enormous goblet with floating chunks of apple and orange into my hand while she took Fred into the kitchen to rub him down and give him something to eat. It allowed me a couple of minutes by her fire to gather my thoughts, for which I was grateful. I tried to distract myself, usually not too difficult in Phyllis’s eclectic sitting room. I looked around the walls: a shield with crocodiles and crossed black spears, a family of ebony hippos, a carving of a man with a beard and kind eyes. Then my gaze fell on the open door to the kitchen and Phyllis’s red range, and it was impossible not to think of the cottage again. I took a deep drink. The wine was a comfort but the smell of food made me queasy. I wasn’t sure how long I would be able to hold off telling her what had happened.
“He seems to have enjoyed his walk,” she said, drying her hands on an old towel when she came back into the room.
I nodded and took another sip of my wine.
Phyllis ladled out a glass for herself from the cauldron on the hearth and eyed me curiously. “Is there something you’re not telling me? Did something happen up there?”
I shook my head and looked at my phone. “Why is the sergeant not with you?”
“He had something he needed to do. He’ll be along later.”
My phone buzzed with a text from Molloy. He had spoken to George; the news was out and I could tell Phyllis. He told me not to give any details and asked if I would pass on his apologies for his absence.
Phyllis sank into her armchair in shock, taking a long draught from her glass. “Oh, my good Lord. How awful. Who on earth would want to do that to Carole?”
I shook my head. “I have no idea.”
“What was she doing up there?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know how long she’d been there.”
Phyllis paled. “Tony’s coming later with Susanne. We’ll have to tell him.”
“I’d be surprised if he hasn’t heard,” I said. “The road up to Sliabh Sneacht is crawling with Garda cars and flashing lights. I’ll be amazed if it isn’t all around the town by now.”
Phyllis shook her head in disbelief. “Christmas Day. Her poor family.”
We sat staring into the fire until the clicking of Fred’s paws as he trotted back into the room roused us. He placed his head on Phyllis’s knee and she fondled his ears affectionately before standing up to take my glass and refill it along with her own.
“How well did you know Carole?” she asked as she lowered herself back down into her chair. For the first time, I noticed her shoes: red Cinderella-style with a strap and a rose on the side that matched her rather startling crimson dress. At any other time, they would have been worthy of comment. Now they just made me think of Carole’s poor feet.
“Not well,” I said. “I didn’t even know she was married until she disappeared. Why?”
Phyllis dropped her gaze. “I’m trying to imagine why someone would want to kill her.”
“And?”
She shifted uncomfortably. “I know it’s too early to speculate, but I always thought she was a bit hidden, if you know what I mean?”
I nodded. “I do, but I thought that was just part of the barmaid’s code. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil, like a taxi driver.”
“I’m not so sure. I think she may have been quite a secretive person.”
“Do you mean she had secrets?” Phyllis shrugged.
“I assume she heard lots of secrets,” I said. “I mean, you would, wouldn’t you, if you were working in a bar with people in their cups …”
Phyllis shot me a sly look. “A bit like a solicitor, you mean?”
“A bit,” I conceded. “Although people aren’t generally drunk when they come to me. Not generally.”
“Do you think it’s possible that she heard something she wasn’t meant to?” Phyllis asked.
“You mean something that got her killed? In Glendara?”
“Maybe.” The doorbell went and Phyllis stood, a grim expression on her face. “That’ll be Tony and Susanne.”
She disappeared downstairs with Fred trailing after her, the dog negotiating the spiral staircase with surprising agility for a creature on four legs. I stared into the fire, continuing Phyllis’s line of thought. I’d shown disbelief, but then I remembered Stan and the noises in the Oak. What if there had been something going on and Carole had discovered it? Eddie had said his sister needed money. What if she had been blackmailing someone?
A few minutes later Phyllis reappeared, alone except for Fred. She sank back into her chair with a groan. “That was Garda McFadden looking for the sergeant. He thought he might be here.”
It occurred to me that Molloy might have gone back to the cottage after speaking to George, might even have taken him there if he’d admitted to knowing his wife’s whereabouts.
“Phyllis, do you know a cottage around the foot of Sliabh Sneacht?” I asked.
She narrowed her eyes to think. “No.” Then her eyes widened. “Oh hang on, is it in a wood? A wee copse of pine trees?”
I nodded.
“It’s tiny – only one bedroom, I’d guess. Empty a long time? Would be completely derelict by now, I’d say?”
“That’s the one,” I said.
“That house used to belong to Peter Stoop, Pat the newsagent’s brother. He’s been dead a long time now. He was a bit of an oddball, Pete, religious nut, kept sheep on that hill …” She broke off suddenly. “Why are you asking me about that?”
I avoided her eye. “We came across it on our walk. It seemed a spooky sort of place.”
“I’d say it is. He came to a rather gruesome end, old Pete Stoop, dead a good few weeks before anyone found him. Terrible really, but the truth was that he drove everyone away. In the end, no one would go near him, he was so unpleasant.” Phyllis gazed into the fire.
“So he died alone?”
“It was assumed so. He was dead so long that no one could tell how he’d died.” She pulled a face. “It was a hot summer that year …”
“Jesus.”
“No one wanted to live there after that.”
“I’m not surprised. Who owns it now?”
“Stoop himself, I’d say. The newsagent, that is. It’s not much use to him up there but I’d say it wouldn’t be too easy to sell either.” She looked at her watch. “Now where are the others? That turkey is going to be done in about fifteen minutes. I know it’s far from being a normal Christmas Day, but people still have to eat. And I’ve prepared enough food to feed an army.”
A third glass of wine, the doorbell rang again and this time it was Tony and his daughter. Phyllis had told me Susanne was the only member of Tony’s family to be home for Christmas, which was why she’d invited them to her orphans’ lunch. But their grim expressions when they walked in made it clear we’d been relieved of passing on the news of Carole’s death at least.
Tony was carrying two bottles of champagne. He looked shocked, almost on the verge of tears. “I bought these before I heard. Seems fairly crass, but I didn’t know what else to do with them.”
“Oh, to hell with it,” Phyllis said, taking them from him and heading out to the kitchen. “I don’t think anybody would argue that we all need a drink.” She called through the doorway, “Will everyone have a glass?”
There were sounds of agreement all round. While Phyllis was gone, Tony introduced his daughter, Susanne, the young woman I’d seen him arguing with on the street, and whom I’d seen later in the bar in Culdaff. Bleached blonde with a pierced nose, and remarkably fit-looking for someone who’d suffered from addictions, she shook my hand without a flicker of a smile.
For all the bookseller’s efforts to inject some Christmas cheer, dinner was a subdued affair. As Maeve had predicted, she had gone to a lot of trouble with the food. There was a turkey with all the trimmings for the traditional taste, but she’d also included some more exotic flourishes she’d picked up on her travels, like coconut and chickpea curry, and prawns in garlic. An eclectic mix. Which was just as well, since as we sat down to eat, Susanne announced she was a vegan. It seemed to come as news to her father, but it didn’t faze Phyllis, who pointed to three or four dishes she could eat.
But Molloy’s empty chair ensured that there was no ignoring the grim reality of the day’s events, and for all of us Christmas pudding seemed a step too far; dessert remained untouched when we left the table and returned to the fire. Even Phyllis seemed to have lost her appetite at that point.
Fred flopped out on the hearth while we attempted to find other avenues of conversation, by unspoken agreement having decided to take a break from Carole’s death. Phyllis asked Susanne about her veganism. I’d noticed a warning look from Tony when his daughter had tried to broach the subject at the table, the same look he gave her whenever she refilled her glass, but now the angry disciple appeared, with her views on animal testing and industrial farming. In the normal course of events I’d have been interested in what she had to say, but today I was distracted, although grateful for her chatter since it allowed me to sink into my own thoughts.
At some point I glanced at Tony, shadows flickering across his face as he gazed into the fire with unseeing eyes, and I realized that he wasn’t listening to his daughter either. He looked worried and sad, hardly surprising when you considered that in the past six days his pub had been burned to the ground and his employee murdered.
During a lull in Susanne’s monologue, Phyllis spoke, a glass of brandy balanced precariously on the arm of her chair. I thought she’d been the only one listening, but it seemed she’d just been putting on a better act.
She sighed. “I can’t stop thinking about George and the boys. Christmas will be forever ruined for them. They must be heartbroken.”
“I thought you said George and Carole couldn’t stand the sight of one another,” Susanne said acidly, throwing a glance at her father.
Tony reddened. “No, I did not. And now is not the time to bring up something like that.”
There was an uncomfortable pause. I stole a glance around the room; Phyllis looked curious, Tony embarrassed, and Susanne had shrunk back in her chair as if she regretted her sharp words. “Although to be fair,” Phyllis leaned forward eventually, “it is the first place the guards are going to look. That’s what usually happens when a woman is killed, isn’t it – they look to the husband or partner first?”
A draught from the kitchen caused one of the candles to gutter, making us all jump. Phyllis went to shut the door, taking the opportunity to refill everyone’s glass before she sat back down.
“So?” She looked at Tony again when she had settled herself. Tony stared into the fire, his thoughts far away.
But Phyllis wasn’t about to let him off her hook. “Come on,” she said impatiently. “What do you know? Did Carole and George have a good marriage?”
Tony shrugged but didn’t look at her. “I suppose. I mean, how can you tell really? None of us knows what goes on behind closed doors, do we?”