Trauma

Nine

The nightmare inside Main’s head was taking him to the very limits of endurance but he knew that he must not pass out. He had to keep flushing the chemical out of his eyes if he was to have any chance at all of keeping his sight. He had never known such pain. His eyes felt as if they were on fire and the pressure inside his head was slowly pushing them out of their sockets. The pungent smell of chlorine was catching his throat, making him splutter; his breathing was uneven through shock. His hands frantically sluiced water up into his face.

Very slowly the pain started to subside and Main became aware of voices in the background. They had been there all along but the fear of going blind had blocked everything else out of his reckoning. At first it was just a hubbub, but then he made out one voice that was louder. “What the hell’s going on?” it asked.

Main continued flushing his eyes. His breathing was returning to normal.

“I asked you a question!” said the voice.

“Bleach... in my eyes,” said Main haltingly.

“That was a stupid thing to do.”

Oh Christ! thought Main. He couldn’t grace the comment with a reply.

“Just look at the mess in here!”

“If only I fucking could!” exploded Main as the sheer crassness of the comment reached him.

“How on earth did you come to get bleach in your eyes?” continued the questioner, backing off a little.

“Someone threw it at me,” answered Main through gritted teeth.

“Bloody hell,” replied the man. “I’m not having this sort of thing in my pub. I run a respectable establishment. This sort of thing is not on!”

“Oh good,” said Main sourly. The pain had subsided sufficiently to let temper take hold but he continued with the sluicing.

“I haven’t had to have the police here once in all the time I’ve been licensee and I’m not starting now. Pull yourself together and get out of here. I don’t want your sort in my place.”

“Maybe we should call an ambulance, John?” suggested a voice from the background but the suggestion was half-hearted as if not to offend.

“I’m not having any ambulances either. You! Get out of here! Do you hear?”

Main felt the hand on his shoulder. He shrugged it off to continue cleaning his eyes.

“Did you hear what I said?”

Main raised his head from the sink at last, and paused for a moment to let the water drain from his face. He turned his head slowly and opened one eye cautiously. His vision was blurred but he could see and that was all that mattered. The landlord’s angry face swam into view. He was a fat man with heavy jowls and a large brown wart on the side of his turned-up nose but Main thought him the most handsome sight he had ever seen. He straightened up and started dabbing at his eyes with his sleeve. He was a foot taller than the landlord who took a pace backwards.

The man’s voice took on a more conciliatory tone. “I just want you out of here. I’m not going to call the police or ask you to pay for the damage; I just want you out of here. All right?”

Main looked at him sourly but felt good inside. He could see. He started to leave without another word. The small group of men near the door parted like the Red Sea, one of them brushing water off his jacket which Main had sprayed him with when he smoothed back his wet hair. As he left the bar he heard the barmaid’s voice telling everyone how she suspected there was something odd about ‘that man’. He had been behaving strangely earlier.

“There’s a lot of weirdos about,” ventured another voice before the door finally closed behind him and Main found himself out in the quiet street and the darkness which caressed him like a friend.

Main walked all the way home. There were a number of reasons, some connected with embarrassment about the way he must look after the fight in the pub, some connected with giving himself time to think on his own but mainly because the cold night air felt good on his eyes. It was making them water which interfered with his vision but not unpleasantly so. There were haloes round all the street lights.

As he walked along he kept feeling his ribs, trying to decide whether or not any had been broken. He concluded not. He had already decided that the injury to his cheek was superficial although it was quite badly swollen. He thought about the pub landlord and cursed under his breath but all in all it had probably worked out for the best. Police involvement might have meant press interest — and having one of their English teachers involved in a pub brawl might have proved less than popular with the governors of Merchiston School, extenuating circumstances or not.

Main made himself some coffee and sat down on the couch to drink it. He wanted to call the police and give them a description of the four men but common sense prevailed. He decided that it would be best to wait until morning. The police were becoming used to his harassing them for action and he didn’t want them dismissing what he had to say as the ravings of a dishevelled drunk in the early hours of the morning.

Main actually felt stone cold sober despite having had a lot to drink earlier on — and that seemed like a year ago — but it would be better if he were to go to the police when he appeared calm and rational. At the moment, the bathroom mirror said that he’d fought a war single handed and lost — the whites of his eyes were appallingly bloodshot. He found some eye lotion in the bathroom cabinet. It had been there since last summer. Mary and Simon had both suffered from hay fever. He paused for a moment with the bottle in his hand but then opened it quickly to avoid maudlin reflection. He wet two swabs of cotton wool with the cool fluid and sat back down on the couch to apply one to each eye.

As he sat there in silence, the pain, discomfort and humiliation the evening had brought all took second place to the knowledge that he had found the men who had disinterred his son. It was true they had got away but only for the moment. The fact that he had found them at all proved his hypothesis. They must live locally. The police would find them and discover what had happened to Simon. His sense of hopelessness had gone.

Main started to go over everything he had heard the men say. There was one little thing kept niggling away at him. They had kept insisting that he ‘had got it all wrong’. What had he got all wrong? It wasn’t just the words, it was the expression on their faces when they said it — and both had said it. They had looked aggrieved, even innocent but they hadn’t tried to deny that they were there that night. So what did it mean?

They had referred to McKirrop as a ‘lying old bastard’ and he assumed that they had been referring to McKirrop’s tale of bravery in the cemetery but now it worried him. Was there something else McKirrop could have been lying about? Surely McKirrop couldn’t have been the one who had disinterred Simon?

Tiredness began to overwhelm Main, but before giving in he forced himself to write down everything that had been said and as detailed a description as he could remember of the four men. He found no trouble with that. The faces of at least two of them would be with him until his dying day. He wished he could draw, but he couldn’t; It would have to be a verbal description that he gave the police.

Ryan Lafferty turned over in his sleep for the umpteenth time and finally conceded that he was not going to get a good night’s rest. He had not really been sleeping at all but had been caught in the uneasy no man’s land between sleep and wakefulness where troubles lie in wait like beasts in the forest. His earlier reading had compounded the problem. He had been going through a chapter in his witchcraft book about Aleister Crowley, perhaps the most infamous witch of the twentieth century.

Crowley, once labelled the wickedest man in the world, had been included in the book on Scottish witchcraft by virtue of his connection with Boleskin House, on the shores of Loch Ness. It was written that, on one occasion, Crowley and his disciples had set out to raise Pan. He and one other man had been locked away in a room to perform the satanic ceremony while the others had to wait until morning before opening the door. When they did, they found Crowley a ‘jibbering lunatic’ and his colleague dead.

Lafferty opened his eyes and looked up at the patterns on the ceiling of his room. The shadow of the bare branches of the beech tree outside wove an intricate moving pattern when the wind moved them. They looked like a spider’s web about to ensnare him.

The telephone rang, startling him. He reached out his hand, trying to think which of his parishioners it could be. He could not think of any who were seriously ill.

Jean O’Donnell’s voice brought him to full wakefulness with the urgency of her tone.

“Father? It’s Mary!”

Lafferty propped himself up on one elbow. He said, “What about her? What’s happened?”

“Oh Father...” Jean O’Donnell broke down in sobs.

“Take your time and tell me, what’s happened?”

“An accident, Father. There’s been an accident.”

“On the bike?”

“Yes. She’s bad Father. She’s really bad.”

“Where is she now?”

“In the Infirmary. The police have just told me.”

“What exactly did they say, Jean?”

Jean O’Donnell sobbed again before answering, “That she’s been involved in a serious road accident. She has bad head injuries. She’s in something called the Head... tr...”

“The Head Trauma Unit?”

“That sounds like it.”

“That’s the best place for her Jean. They’re experts on head injuries up there.”

“Oh Father...”

“I know Jean. Are you going to the hospital just now?”

“Joe’s just getting dressed.”

“I’m on my way. I’ll see you there.”

When Lafferty arrived at the hospital he found Jean O’Donnell and her husband already there. They were huddled together in the otherwise empty waiting room.

“No, don’t get up,” urged Lafferty as he approached. He drew one of the plastic chairs out of the line and sat down facing the couple, leaning forward with his arms on his knees. “Any news?” he asked.

“We’re just waiting for the doctor to come down.”

Lafferty held out his hands and took a hand each from Joe and Jean in his own. He said a prayer and Jean said ‘Amen’ at the end but Joe just stared at the floor as if in a world of his own. The sound of footsteps made Lafferty turn his head. A young woman in a white coat was coming towards them. He stood up.

The woman looked at Lafferty and then at the couple. She said, “Mr and Mrs O’Donnell? I’m Doctor Lasseter.”

Sarah turned to look at Lafferty and Jean O’Donnell said, “This is Father Lafferty, Doctor, our parish priest.”

The name registered with Sarah and Lafferty smiled at the recognition in her eyes. He said, “I think we’ve spoken on the telephone, Doctor.”

“How is she?” asked Jean.

“Not very well at all I’m afraid,” replied Sarah. “She’s on a life-support machine at the moment. It’s too early to say how severe her head injuries are, but I think it would be foolish to give you false hope. She’s very badly hurt.”

Jean started to sob into her handkerchief and Joe wrapped his arm more tightly around her.

“Do you know exactly what happened, Doctor?” asked Lafferty gently.

Sarah said, “I understand from my colleagues in A&E that she was the pillion passenger on a motor-cycle. There was an accident involving another vehicle. Mary was catapulted off the machine.” Sarah’s voice fell to a whisper. “I believe she collided with a tree.”

Joe O’Donnell who had stared resolutely at the floor throughout the conversation suddenly looked up and said, “I’ll kill the bastard! I’ll take his bloody life!”

Jean restrained him and Lafferty put a hand on his shoulder too. Sarah said softly, “If it’s the young man who was riding the motor cycle you’re talking about, I’m afraid he’s dead. He was killed outright.”

Joe O’Donnell put his hands over his face and shook his head as anger, grief and frustration threatened to overwhelm him. “I’m sorry,” he sobbed through his fingers. “I just...”

“Take it easy,” said Lafferty gently.

“Can we see her?” asked Jean.

“Of course,” replied Sarah. “But she is on a life-support machine.”

“What does that mean exactly?” asked Jean.

“Quite simply it means that a machine is breathing for her. We place an airway tube into her throat and she is ventilated artificially by a respirator. We also have tubes going down into her stomach and another tube going into a vein so that we can feed and medicate her. So be prepared.”

Sarah led the way upstairs to HTU, Joe and Jean followed, still with their arms around each other and Lafferty brought up the rear.

In the early hours of the morning the stair well seemed cold but Lafferty’s momentary urge to shiver faded as they passed through swing doors into HTU and felt the warmth hit them. As if needing to break the silence, Jean said, “It’s very warm in here.”

“We have to keep it that way for the patients,” said Sarah. “In a unit like this clothes and blankets get in the way.”

Lafferty saw what she meant. Mary O’Donnell was clad in a simple white hospital shift which left her throat and arms bare for ease of access. An unsightly plastic airway protruded from her mouth and her chest rose and fell in response to the ventilator that hissed and clicked beside her bed. Electrode wires snaked out from the bandaging on her head and she had suffered some superficial grazing to her face which had left an angry red weal. Her eyes were closed and there was no response from her when her mother, unable to restrain herself, knelt down by the bed and laid her face against her shoulder, sobbing her concern.

Joe placed a hand awkwardly on his wife’s shoulder and helped her to her feet.

“Can we stay?” asked Jean when she had recovered.

“I really don’t think there’s much point,” responded Sarah gently. “Nothing will happen tonight. We’ll know more when we run tests on her tomorrow.”

“But if she should... get worse and...”

“Mary will not die,” said Sarah. “The machine is breathing for her.”

Jean looked puzzled. She asked, “Are you saying that she can’t die?”

“More or less,” said Sarah. “As long as she’s on the ventilator we can keep her blood oxygenated so technically Mary cannot die.”

Jean O’Donnell looked as if a great weight had been removed from her shoulders. “It’s wonderful what they can do,” said her husband.

“But,” cautioned Sarah, “it may be that Mary’s brain is so damaged she won’t be able to recover.”

“You mean she could be a vegetable, don’t you?” said Jean.

“It’s possible,” said Sarah. “We’ll have to hope for the best.”

“And pray,” said Jean, looking down at her daughter.

“You will pray for her, Father, won’t you?” she asked Lafferty without turning round.

“You know I will,” said Lafferty.

“Go home now,” said Sarah kindly. “Try to sleep. We’ll call you in the morning when we know more.”

Jean looked up at Joe who nodded. Joe wrapped his arm round her again and nodded his thanks to Sarah before setting off for the door. Lafferty was left standing there.

Sarah looked at him and said, “I’m glad to get the opportunity to apologise to you in person, Father Lafferty. I really am most sorry that I didn’t inform you of John McKirrop’s death.”

“That’s over and done with, Doctor Lasseter. Don’t give it another thought.”

“That’s gracious of you, Father. Can I offer you some coffee?”

“Most welcome,” accepted Lafferty, gratefully. He followed Sarah to the duty room where she switched on an electric kettle.

“It’ll be instant I’m afraid.”

“That’s fine but are you sure you don’t want to get back to bed? I assume you were called out for Mary?”

Sarah nodded and said, “That’s OK. I could do with some coffee. You don’t think I was too direct — too frank — with the O’Donnells, do you?” Sarah had turned to face Lafferty and he was surprised at the vulnerability in her eyes. His heart went out to her. “Not at all. Can I take it from what you said that there’s not much hope for Mary?”

Sarah shook her head and said, “I don’t honestly think so. The crash helmet she was wearing didn’t fit properly and had actually been damaged in a previous accident. Her injuries are very bad. That’s why I felt I had to try to prepare the O’Donnells for the worst.”

Lafferty nodded and said, “You did it kindly.”

Sarah let out her breath and said, “You don’t know how relieved I am to hear you say that. You know, it’s an awful thing but when you see broken bodies day in day out and weeping relatives it’s so hard to find...”

“New compassion?” asked Lafferty.

“Exactly,” nodded Sarah. “I can feel it happening to me and I feel so guilty but I can’t seem to stop the hardening process. There are times when I hate myself for it but I can’t fight it.”

“No you can’t,” said Lafferty. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. It’s your body’s way of telling you that it can’t stand the strain of carrying everyone else’s grief. It’s too much for anyone. Don’t worry. Underneath it all you haven’t changed. You’re still the same caring person you were before you came into medicine. The fact that you worry about it says so.”

Sarah looked at Lafferty for a moment before saying, “Do you know, I probably shouldn’t say this but that’s the first time I’ve ever heard anything comforting from a man of the cloth.”

Lafferty laughed and said, “Then my day has not entirely been in vain.”

“More coffee?”

“That was fine,” said Lafferty who started to get up. He said, “I hope you don’t mind my saying this but what you said on the telephone about John McKirrop regaining or not regaining consciousness has been puzzling me.”

Sarah visibly stiffened at the name, McKirrop, and Lafferty noticed. “If it’s none of my business,” he said. “Just tell me and I’ll shut up.”

Sarah desperately did want to talk to someone about McKirrop’s death but she needed to think about it first. She confined what she had to say to the disagreement over whether McKirrop had been conscious or not.

“And you think he knew what he was saying?” said Lafferty when she had finished.

“Yes,” affirmed Sarah. “He didn’t remember anything about the assault which brought him in here but I’m sure he was quite lucid about what happened in the cemetery.”

“That’s really what I wanted to talk to him about,” said Lafferty.

“Really?” said Sarah.

“I’ve been trying to help John Main find out what happened to his son’s body,” said Lafferty.

“I see,” said Sarah. “Poor man, he’s had quite enough to contend with without that happening.”

“You know him?” asked Lafferty.

“Not personally, but his son died here in HTU,” said Sarah.

“Of course, I’d forgotten,” said Lafferty. “Can you remember what McKirrop actually said when he came round?” he asked.

Sarah took a deep breath and said, “It was really just a case of a few phrases but he clearly remembered the empty coffin. He said that two or three times. And something about yobs beating him up.”

“Yobs?” asked Lafferty with a puzzled frown. “He used that word?”

“Yes, yobs.”

“Anything else?”

“No, I think that was it.”

“I’m grateful to you for talking to me about it,” said Lafferty.

“It’s the very least I could do in the circumstances,” said Sarah.

“Good night, Doctor,” said Lafferty. “From what you said about Mary, I fear we may meet again before long.”

Sarah nodded slightly and said good night. Lafferty left.

There were grey streaks of dawn in the sky as Lafferty walked across the courtyard to his car. A milk float cruised past the main gate, its full load of bottles bouncing in unison in their crates as its small wheels made heavy work of the uneven surface. Yobs, was a funny word to use to describe Satanists, he thought as he struggled to put the ignition key in place in the darkness. Yobs conjured up images of tearaways, vandals, and thugs, people who broke and destroyed things — but grave-robbing? That was something else. That wasn’t their style at all. The engine of the old Ford Escort sprang into life accompanied by a squeal which said that the clutch release bearing needed attention. He really must get it fixed soon.

In theory, Sarah should have had the morning off but it was Tyndall’s ward round and it was expected that she should be there for that and the medical meeting afterwards. She arrived in the unit fifteen minutes early so that she could brief Logan on Mary O’Donnell and found him with the patient when she arrived. She noted that he’d written her up for Sigma probes.

“Do you think it’s worth it?” she inquired. “She has massive brain damage.”

“Anyone under eighteen gets Sigma Probes routinely,” replied Logan. “It’s written into the trial protocol. We have discretion with older patients but the rules apply to our young friend here.”

“I see,” said Sarah.

“I thought you knew that,” said Logan.

“No one told me.”

Logan did not respond.

“Will you be carrying out the scans on Miss O’Donnell?” Sarah asked.

“Unless Dr Tyndall says otherwise. Why?”

“It’s just that I met her parents last night and her parish priest. I’m interested in the outcome,” said Sarah. She felt uncomfortable saying it, as if she were inviting Logan to slap her down.

Sure enough, Logan said, “Don’t become personally involved with the patients. I think I’ve told you that before. It will drain you. You won’t be able to function properly as a doctor. You’ll be finished in this kind of medicine within a year. Think of them as cases, nothing more. Do your best for them, but keep it impersonal.”

“Perhaps there’s a middle way, Dr Logan,” said Sarah in a tone that suggested Logan had missed it by a mile.

“I’m only saying this for your own good,” said Logan. “You won’t last a year.”

“I don’t intend to make my career in this kind of medicine anyway,” said Sarah.

“Oh yes,” smiled Logan, “I heard. You’ve set your heart on being a GP — just like Daddy.”

Sarah coloured with anger but she kept a rein on her tongue.

“That’s different then. You can get involved all you want to with sore throats and boils on the bum. Demanding stuff.”

“There’s a lot more to being a GP than that,” answered Sarah.

“I forgot about the ante-natal clinics,” murmured Logan.

Sarah responded with a look of disdain.

Logan seemed to take it in his stride. He looked at Sarah and said, “Look around you! This is where it’s at. Front line medicine! You’ve been given the chance to work at the very forefront of medical science and all you can think about is a career doling out HRT to the Women’s Institute!”

“That is absolutely...!” Words failed Sarah as she tried to respond to Logan’s sneer. What hurt her most was the awful feeling of disloyalty that had come over her because somewhere at the back of her mind a part of her agreed with everything Logan had said.

“Good morning everyone,” said Murdoch Tyndall’s voice and Sarah and Logan froze in mid argument. “Good morning sir,” they said in unison without breaking eye contact.

“Shall we begin?”

The consultant’s round went smoothly enough with Logan briefing Tyndall on the progress of each patient in turn and Sarah speaking when she was spoken to. Mary O’Donnell was the last patient to be considered as she was the latest admission. Tyndall read the notes and murmured, “Doesn’t look good does it?”

“No sir.”

“Will you do the scans this morning?”

“Yes sir. About the Sigma Probes? Will you implant them?”

“I’ll do it before I go. Do we have a sterile set?”

Sister Roche said, “Yes, sir.”

“Do we know about relatives?”

Logan turned to Sarah. She said, “I saw both parents early this morning when we admitted her from A&E. The patient’s parish priest was also here.”

“A little premature,” said Tyndall, beaming slightly to advertise his joke.

“I got the impression that Father Lafferty is a family friend,” said Sarah.

“Lafferty?”

“Yes sir.”

“Wasn’t he the chap who had an interest in Mr McKirrop?”

“Yes sir.”

“If he keeps this up we’ll have to make him chaplain to the unit!” said Tyndall.

Everyone smiled on cue.

“I hope you didn’t build their hopes too high,” said Tyndall, becoming serious again.

“No sir,” said Sarah. “I think they realised the seriousness of the position.”

“Good,” said Tyndall gravely. “We may have to see them after the scans are complete. We don’t want this to drag on if there’s no chance of recovery.” He turned to Sarah and asked, “I don’t suppose you can give us an indication what the priest’s position might be on discontinuing the ventilator if it should come to that?”

“Not really sir,” replied Sarah. “But he struck me as an eminently sensible man.”

“Good,” said Tyndall. “The last thing we need is a self-righteous nutter causing all kinds of distress to everyone.”

“No, sir.”

“Well, that’s it then. I’ll do the probes if you prepare a tray Sister.”

“Yes sir,” said Roche.

Tyndall went to scrub up for the minor surgical procedure involved in implanting the Sigma probes in Mary O’Donnell’s skull. A few minutes later the phone rang in the duty room and a nurse announced that it was Mrs O’Donnell.

“You take it,” said Logan to Sarah. “I’ll prepare for the scans. You can tell her we should be done by twelve. We’ll know more then. You know the routine.”

Sarah spoke to Jean O’Donnell and told her that Mary’s condition was unchanged. She didn’t remind her that it couldn’t change with machines doing everything for her.

“Does that mean she’s got a chance then?” asked Jean O’Donnell eagerly.

A lump came to Sarah’s throat. She said, “I’m afraid it doesn’t in itself, Mrs O’Donnell. It means that her physical state is unchanged but we don’t know anything about the damage to her brain as yet. Dr Logan is just about to begin her scans. Can you call back about lunch time?”

“Yes, Doctor, and — thank you.”

“I’ll speak to you later,” said Sarah.

Lafferty spent the morning in the church praying for the recovery of Mary O’Donnell but also for strength to bring comfort to her grieving parents should it be necessary. After his conversation with Sarah Lasseter in the early hours of the morning he suspected that the latter would be more relevant. He wondered how Jean would take it. She’d always had an unshakable faith. Please God it would survive the death of her daughter.

Joseph O’Donnell would be bitter and, when mixed with the guilt he was feeling, it might prove a heady cocktail to handle. Joe needed someone or something to blame. He and Mary had been at loggerheads for weeks over her boyfriend and the hours she kept. Joe clearly loved his daughter but the fact that he would never be able to tell her this and that she had died with so much bad feeling between them would be hard for him to bear. He would feel resentful and betrayed.

Lafferty phoned to ask if there was any news. Joe O’Donnell answered.

“Still the same,” he said.

“No sign of improvement?”

“They’re doing tests this morning.”

“I’ll call back later, Joe.”

“Father?”

“Yes?”

“About the fight Mary and I had last week — the mark on her head — I didn’t mean her no harm. I mean... I love her really.”

“I know that, Joe. Don’t worry about it. I’ll speak to you later.”

Lafferty was sitting thinking about Joe when the phone rang. It was John Main and he sounded revitalised.

“I thought you’d like to know, I found them, Ryan. I found them last night.”

Lafferty had to think for a moment before he realised what Main meant. “You mean, the people who took Simon?” he exclaimed.

“Yes. I found them, all four of them.”

“How in God’s name did you do it?” asked Lafferty.

Main explained the thinking behind his pub crawl and what had happened when he had put the theory into practice. “They were in the very last one I visited. I’ve just been down at police headquarters with their descriptions.”

“Descriptions?” asked Lafferty.

Main told him about the fight in the pub and how he’d nearly lost his sight.

Lafferty frowned and asked, “Are your eyes all right?”

“Still a bit sore but I can see,” said Main. “I’ll survive.”

“So who are these people?” asked Lafferty. “Did the police have any idea?”

“I had a look through their mug shot books but I didn’t recognise anyone. They seemed like plain, ordinary yobs to me,” said Main. “But the police are confident they’ll find them now they know where to look.”

There was that word again, thought Lafferty. ‘Yobs’.

“How can you be sure these are the men?” he asked.

“They didn’t deny it,” answered Main.

“You mean they admitted taking Simon’s body?” exclaimed Lafferty.

“They didn’t go that far,” said Main. “They tried to suggest I’d got it all wrong but they knew McKirrop, all right and they admitted being there in the cemetery that night.”

“Thank God. I’m afraid I’ve been getting nowhere at the library. I hope the police pick these men up soon; this has all been a nightmare for you.”

“You can say that again,” agreed Main. “But we’re nearly there. It may be that these four were acting on behalf of someone else, but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

“Indeed we will,” said Lafferty. “Keep me informed.”

“I will.”

Lafferty replaced the receiver and put his hands to his cheeks. He massaged them gently while he thought about what Main had said. McKirrop had used the term ‘yobs’ in his semi-conscious ramblings and it had registered with him as being incongruous. Now Main had described the four men in the pub as ‘yobs’. This meant that it hadn’t been just a bad choice of word on McKirrop’s part. The grave robbers really had been young tearaways. He returned to his earlier hypothesis that yobs didn’t steal bodies. So what did it all mean?

Main’s idea could be right. They could have been doing the dirty work for someone else, but it sounded as if they hadn’t suggested that themselves when Main confronted them. According to Main, they had said he had ‘got it all wrong’.

That was interesting, thought Lafferty. When an accused said something like that it was usually a precursor to a plea of innocence, but if the men admitted being there in the cemetery that night how could they possibly hope to plead innocence?