IT SEEMED TO have been raining for days. St. Brigid’s Day, February 1, is the first day of spring in Ireland, but usually a day when it appears as if the weather is having a laugh at the very idea of it. Today, though, the sun was shining. My office was a latticework of light and shade, and I found myself gazing at patterns on the wall cast by the blinds. I’d been distracted, unable to work all morning.
I stood up and walked over to the window, pulled the blinds aside, and looked out. The street was silent, empty like a ghost town, although I knew it wouldn’t be for long. The phone rang and I returned to my desk to answer it: a client making an appointment for next week. I took a note. Leah had diverted the phones for the hour or so she’d be gone. She’d forgiven me; the events at the boatshed had washed away all upset in a flood of sympathy and concern. Also, she’d moved into full wedding-planning mode, which had helped to take her mind off things.
I heard them coming. Footsteps, marching. Chanting. Hands off our Garda station. Hands off our Garda station. I returned to the window. This time the street was full, the crowd stretching from footpath to footpath. Townspeople with placards, punching their fists in the air. Familiar faces – Phyllis, Maeve, Liam, Leah. A protest march.
I heard the door open downstairs, then footsteps taking the stairs two at a time. A voice behind me, a Cork accent. “It’s not going to do any good.”
I turned. Molloy was standing in the doorway, dressed in jeans and a grey sweater; it matched his eyes, didn’t match the dark crescents underneath.
“The decision is made. The station is closing in a month, no matter what happens – it’s a question of numbers, population.” He looked down. “I’ve known it’s been coming for a while.”
“I figured that. Although I wish you’d told me instead of making me think you were having second thoughts.”
His face softened. “About us? Is that what you thought?”
“Among other things.”
“I didn’t want you to take all the flak for going out with the local sergeant only for me to be moved.” His expression darkened. “I was also afraid I wouldn’t be able to protect you if you needed it.”
“Where will they send you? I suppose there’s no chance it will be Letterkenny?” I smiled weakly.
I felt a pinprick of fear when he didn’t reply. Instead he came over to join me at the window, and we stood in silence looking down at the march. I spotted Susanne Craig, still pale, shaken, holding onto her father’s arm for support. But she was also holding onto Stan.
“So, Stan finally gets his family,” I said.
“Tony’s going to need the support,” Molloy said. “Susanne’s been charged with arson.”
His voice was tense. He still looked drawn. I’d thought things would improve in the weeks since the explosion, but they hadn’t. He’d stayed with me a couple of nights, but his sleep had been so disrupted by nightmares that he’d left at six each morning. I was worried about him, worried that I was part of the problem. When the shock of Luke’s death had eased, I’d felt a rush, a release of something I’d been holding onto for years, but I knew Molloy was feeling the opposite.
“Any news on Róisín?” I asked.
I’d caught sight of her parents below, a couple who seemed to have shrunk visibly in the past few weeks. I was pleased to see them taking part.
“Arrested at an anti-whaling protest in Russia. She was part of the protest but there was no evidence against her for anything criminal, so she was released without charge. They didn’t know we were after her until it was too late.”
I’d been to see Róisín’s mother the week before. She told me that Róisín had been a vegan since she was old enough to work out what meat was; that she’d wanted to become involved politically, but they had discouraged her. They’d had no idea how deeply she’d been involved online, or that she had used her trip to Australia to travel to meet other activists, returning via Spain, where she met Luke. She’d shown me a picture that had made her cry. It showed Susanne and Róisín standing in a square in their school uniforms. They were surrounded by pigeons; each girl had one on her head and two or three feeding from each hand. Susanne was beaming; Róisín unsmiling, intense.
I crossed my arms. “They thought when she came back from Australia that she’d stay, especially as she was going out with Eddie. But she only came back to say goodbye; she’d made the decision to devote her life to what she believed in. Poor Eddie was just a beard. She’ll do this for the rest of her days now, won’t she? Until it kills her. She’s another Dominic Stoop.”
Molloy nodded, shielding his eyes against the sun. “So it seems. Susanne was a liability. She says she only became involved in the first place because of Róisín; went to Spain to meet her. They met Luke there. He could organize explosives, which, together with Dominic’s introduction, made him accepted. The corporate lawyer turned eco-warrior. But you were right, he did have his own agenda.”
“Luke always had his own agenda,” I said quietly. It still felt strange to use his name in the past tense.
“After he killed Carole that night, he rang Susanne,” Molloy said. “She and Róisín had come back from Culdaff to move the explosives from the pub cellar to Róisín’s parents’ farm. When Susanne got to the cottage, Luke was there with Carole’s body. Luke terrified her, hinting that her presence would make her a suspect, especially since she’d had an affair with George. Susanne was drunk and scared and agreed to keep it quiet. They left Carole strangled in a chair.”
I shuddered. The image was grim.
“As you said, Kirby was careful about DNA,” Molloy continued. “He’d been burned once. He left to go back to Derry, didn’t seem too concerned. But Susanne panicked. She went back to the Oak with Eddie’s keys and started to drink on her own. The drunker she got, the more she convinced herself that if she set the pub on fire, then everyone would think that Carole had done it and that was why she had run off. She also had Carole’s phone.”
“So she sent those texts to George over the next few days to reinforce that?”
Molloy nodded. “I suspect she may have gleaned some satisfaction from taunting him. She said that Luke knew how hurt she’d been when George didn’t leave Carole for her.”
“Never a good idea to confide in Luke Kirby.”
“Or Róisín. Susanne told Róisín everything a few days later when she overheard you talking about going up to Sliabh Sneacht on Christmas Day. She panicked again, thinking the body would be found. She says that Róisín thought the body should be found, that she persuaded Susanne they should move it and Róisín would give her an alibi. So that’s what they did, on Christmas Eve, using the overgrown laneway from Róisín’s house. Susanne even put petrol on Carole’s hands in an attempt to exonerate herself.”
“So Róisín had some feeling for Eddie’s family then.”
“Looks like it.”
“And that’s why they put the socks by the body,” I said. “As a kind of flag. And to make doubly sure, Róisín went up there on Christmas morning and whistled to Fred, the whistle I captured on my phone. What about the belt?”
“Susanne says she found it in her bag. She thinks Kirby left it there to scare her. She and Róisín took it up to Sliabh Sneacht and left it there, thinking it would have Kirby’s DNA on it.”
Molloy turned to me. “The tests on the sandwich are back, by the way – it was clear. Guinness must have picked up the antifreeze somewhere else, if that’s what it was.”
“Really? So a case of paranoia on my part, then.”
Molloy gave me a wry look. “Except it wasn’t, was it?”
“No, I suppose not.” I wrinkled my nose against the sun. “How is Andy?”
Molloy looked at me in surprise. “He’s good. He’s getting some help.”
I looked down. “I owe you an apology …”
“Ben, there’s something I need to tell you.” Molloy pushed the blinds aside and looked down at the crowd again, as if it were easier not to meet my eye. I felt a crushing sensation in my chest. Whatever it was, I was pretty sure I didn’t want to hear it. “I’ve been placed on leave pending an investigation into Kirby’s death.”
I spun around. “What?”
“There’s to be an inquest. And they’ll probably be looking into my relationship with you.”
“I don’t believe you. How can you be so calm about it?”
He turned to me and smiled. “It’s fine. It’s what should happen. It’s perfectly possible that our relationship clouded my judgement.”
“How long?”
“A few months.” He looked down. “Maybe six.”
“Are you staying here?” I asked, but I knew the answer before the words left my mouth.
He shook his head.
“You’re going back to Cork?”
He nodded. “I think it’s better. Just for a while.”