How hard could it be to call and update me on what was happening? It was over twenty-four hours since I had told Lenihan that Gill owned the house next door, and emailed him my theory about Esther Gill’s car. I was doing Lenihan’s job for him. The least he could do was keep me informed. I hoped that he was following up on the leads, but who knew?
I spent the morning, after Davy had left for work, intermittently reviewing the file I had on Deirdre’s case. I didn’t get far. There was no sign yet of the DNA results or the medical records. The longer they took to arrive, the more pessimistic I became. The drinks coaster was probably hopelessly cross-contaminated and the medical records were probably silent on anything that might identify the rapist, be that Joey O’Connor or Jeremy Gill. My case was hopelessly stalled, and it was impossible for me to concentrate while I was waiting for news on the murder investigation.
The doorbell rang at 10.15. I jumped.
‘Morning, Finn, is it?’ the voice on the intercom said.
‘Who’s this?’
‘Andy O’Mahony, electrician, your fella sent me up to fit the security light on the gate, like.’
I buzzed him in. I had mentioned to Davy that I agreed with him now that I needed a security light. Had there been one, Gill wouldn’t have been able to conceal himself unseen, where I assumed he had been, in the recess to the left of the gate, while I took out the bins. But I hadn’t asked Davy to organise it for me, and part of me was annoyed that he had; the part that didn’t like people taking care of me, the same part that liked being in control of all things at all times. But another part of me had wanted Davy to be with me last night, had asked him to stay.
So I scowled at Andy O’Mahony, but I let him do the job. I even brought him down a mug of tea with the three spoons of sugar he had specified.
‘He’s not my fella, by the way,’ I said.
‘Who?’
‘Davy Keenan.’
‘Oh right,’ Andy said. ‘What is he so?’
‘I’m not sure any more.’
‘That sounds interesting.’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘That’s one way of putting it.’
After Andy left, I remained in the garden. I took a brush from the shed and swept the paths clear of snipped electrical cable and leaves. For a time, I leant against the stone wall and remembered the previous Tuesday night, when Davy I had stood in this place in the rain and, later, slept together for the first time.
Since then, Rhona had been murdered, and so much else had happened. And yet, in the middle of all the chaos, Davy and I hadn’t been able to keep our hands off each other. Worse, he had been to my parents’ house for Sunday lunch. Now he had started organising home improvements for me. It had to stop, I knew that. And soon.
But not yet.
Upstairs, I started thinking about the case again. I was going to make no progress here. And I had to get out of the house before I started kicking the walls.
Now, I was walking towards UCC, looking for Lorcan Lucey who had been on the festival youth jury with Deirdre. I had left a couple of messages for him but he had never returned my calls. According to his timetable, he was giving a lecture in the west wing of the Quad right now. I wasn’t expecting much from him but I had to cross him off my list. Going by Fort Street was the more direct route, though, if I went that way, I would be confronted with the charred corpse of my car. Instead, I walked up Barrack Street, the ancient road in and out of the city from the west. At one time, almost every house had been a shop or pub. Now, many were derelict or vacant, while others had been converted into rough living quarters for students and other renters. Dotted amid the wreckage were well-cared-for owner-occupied homes. And the few remaining businesses traded with pride and defiance. Halfway up, Tom Barry’s pub glowed like a sapphire.
At Denroches Cross, the road divided. I took the lower fork and looked behind me before turning sharp right through the gap on to Wycherley Terrace. If anyone was going to jump me and drag me into a car or split my cranium with an axe, this was where they’d do it, a short low passage underneath and between two houses. But the road was clear.
The closer I got to College, the more stolen road signs and heaps of empty beer cans were visible inside grubby windows. Formerly a leafy suburb, most of the area had been colonised by students now. For eight months of the year, the ordinary residents had to endure the horror of Thursday nights in term time, and Rag Week, and Hallowe’en, and the ‘Twelve Pubs of Christmas’ vomit fest. It was all very far from Newman’s Idea of a University.
But at weekends, and out of term, and coming up to exam time, the streets were as quiet and pleasant as they had always been, and the student presence meant that there were cafes, well-stocked local shops, hairdressers, even a bank, that might have closed otherwise.
I skirted the edge of the Quad – the abiding superstition was that to cross it would result in certain exam failure – and entered the stone corridor. Leaning against the wall opposite the door to W5, I could hear the lecturer’s voice. Though I was unable to make out the words, his timetable had told me that today he was talking about the philosopher George Berkeley who, two centuries or more before, had been bishop of Cloyne, half an hour east of the city.
Within a couple of minutes, the cold of the limestone had permeated my jacket. I stood out from the wall and shook myself warm as students began to file out of the lecture theatre. I went against the flow, not wanting to miss the elusive Dr Lucey. He was standing by the lectern, being subjected to the anxious attentions of two students. Presumably no older than his early thirties, Lorcan Lucey was prematurely grey, with tired-looking white rabbit eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses. I waited until his glance fell on me.
‘Are you waiting for me?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘You are?’ he said, after the students had gone.
‘Finn Fitzpatrick. I left you a couple of voicemails.’
‘I don’t listen to them. Waste of time.’
There was no point mentioning the message left with the department secretary. Before I had a chance to speak again, Lucey fired another question.
‘You want to talk to me because …?’
‘It’s about a workshop that I think you did in 1998 at Cork Film Festival, with the film director Jeremy Gill. I represent the parents of one of the other participants, Deirdre Carney. Do you remember the workshop and do you remember her?’
‘I remember both,’ Lucey said. ‘Is that it? Are we done?’
‘No,’ I said, through gritted teeth. ‘If I can buy you a coffee I’ll explain.’
‘Well, as long as it doesn’t take too long, I suppose I could go for coffee. Though when I say coffee, I mean tea. Earl Grey, to be precise. Come along now. Let’s go to the staff common room. That’s our best bet at this time of day, methinks.’
Lorcan Lucey sped off like a beetle, his black gown billowing after him. He dodged around the corner into the north wing, under the stone arch, past the Ogham Stones and up the stone steps. I had to keep up a good pace to stay with him. By the time I got to the common room, he had already taken a seat at a window table. I loved this room, the vaulted ceilings and wood panelling, the views onto the wooded heights of Sunday’s Well. Lucey made no move to join me at the counter. It looked like he was used to being waited on. By his mother, presumably.
‘You’re fit,’ I said as I laid the tea things on the table in front of him.
‘Fencing,’ Lucey said. ‘I was auditor of the Fencing Society when I was an undergraduate, and I’ve kept in practice. Mens sana in corpore sano.’
‘Dead right,’ I said.
Tosser, I thought. Lorcan Lucey was so self-obsessed, he wouldn’t notice anything beyond his own nose. This was going to be a complete waste of time.
After Lucey had poured his tea, he spoke again.
‘I’m intrigued,’ he said.
I repeated the history that I’d given to other potential witnesses, told him about Deirdre’s death and asked about his recollections of the workshop. As expected, he had nothing to add to what Jessica Murphy and Joey O’Connor had told me.
‘Thanks for your help. I take it that you didn’t keep in contact with Deirdre?’
‘No, not at all,’ Lucey said.
‘Different schools, of course,’ I said. ‘And her life changed considerably after she became ill.’
‘So sad, really. I had no idea. I think I only saw her once after the festival, and that wasn’t very long after it.’
‘Can you remember where you saw her?’
‘Out at Muskerry Castle Hotel. We were there for a family occasion, my grandfather’s birthday in fact. His seventieth.’
‘Did you talk to her?’
‘No I didn’t. But it stuck in my mind. I was in the lobby and she was walking upstairs towards the bedrooms. I thought it was unusual because I knew she was from Cork. I remember wondering why she was staying in the hotel but I can’t say I thought much more about it than that.’
‘Was she with anyone?’
‘No, she was on her own.’
‘Dr Lucey, do you remember when this was?’
‘Well, my grandfather’s eighty-five now, so …’
‘The date, Dr Lucey? Can you remember the date? It’s very important, or at least it might be.’
I held my breath.
‘Well, he has the same birthday now as he always had. That hasn’t changed,’ Lucey snorted. ‘So, yes, it was the 12th of December. The 12th of December 1998.’