Gallows Lane

Chapter Eighteen

Monday, 14 June

The long promised thunderstorm rumbled across Donegal throughout the night, flooding the fields and creating a sheen of dust and grease on the roads that would result in several accidents before lunch.

At around three-thirty, above the rumbling of the storm, a louder smash woke me from my sleep. Debbie was already awake and out of bed, going to check on the kids in case one of them had fallen out of bed. But I knew that the noise had come from below and had a suspicion I knew what it was. I wasn’t wholly surprised when I went down to the living room to find the rain lashing in through a broken window pane, a chunk of red brick resting on the carpet amongst a nest of shattered glass.

For the first time since being made a DI I wore my Garda uniform. I had to be in Sligo for noon, which gave me time to get into the station and leave the paperwork I’d prepared for the NBCI team with Williams. On my way in I remembered to stop at a call box just on the border and called the station. There was little point in having Kerr’s tract in O’Kane’s car, if no one knew it was there.

When I got into work, the place was quiet. I spotted Miriam Powell’s car parked on the street outside and assumed she was in for some last-minute pointers from Costello before she set off for Sligo. Patterson wasn’t about, though I knew his interview was scheduled for mid-afternoon.

Just after nine-thirty, Burgess told me there was a call for me. I imagined it was Debbie, phoning to wish me good luck or to offer some advice. I was wrong.

‘Devlin?’

‘Yes, who’s this?’ I did not recognize the voice. It sounded local and was clearly a man’s though, as he spoke, I got the impression he was holding something between his mouth and the receiver to disguise himself. Which meant it was someone I knew, or someone who thought that I would know his voice.

‘Keep your fucking mouth shut, all right?’

I was caught totally off guard and stuttered a few times as I tried to speak.

‘Keep your mouth shut and keep your nose out of other people’s business. If you don’t — your wee girl gets one in the head. Don’t think I’m bluffing.’

‘Who is-’ I started to say, planning to make all kinds of threats of my own, but the line was dead and whoever had called had simply slipped back into anonymity.

‘What’s wrong?’ someone said, and I looked up to see Williams standing above me. Her face seemed to distort and twist and the room suddenly shifted sideways.

I felt her hand on my shoulder and she squatted beside me. She placed the flat of her hand against my face and looked me in the eye and I was aware of her talking to me, soothingly. I looked into her eyes and felt the softness of her skin against my cheek. I felt my panic begin to recede, almost saw the greyness lifted from the air around me, and heard again the hushed murmuring of the office which seemed to have paused in my panic. And I saw Williams’s eyes, the tapering of her chin, her mouth, her lips parted and slightly reddened. I placed my hand over hers.

‘Are you okay?’ she asked.

I nodded, my throat too dry to speak.

‘What happened? Another panic attack?’ She whispered it as she spoke, almost as if it were a shared secret.

‘A phone call,’ I finally said, holding on to her hand even as she removed it from my face. She sat on the chair next to me and held my hand in both of hers.

‘What about?’

‘If I don’t keep my mouth shut, they’re going to do something to Penny,’ I said, and my panic began to rise again. I tried to stand up, to move, to do something decisive, but my legs failed me and I sat again. Williams intertwined her fingers in mine, distracting me again.

‘Jesus, Ben. Do you know who it was? Tell Costello.’

Her face was so close to me, I could feel her breath in mine. We looked at each other, but neither of us moved, neither of us attempted to disentangle our hands.

‘There’s been a call,’ she finally managed. ‘About Kerr-’ she began, but she was interrupted.

‘Inter-Gardai relationships have become very intimate.’

I looked up at Miriam Powell who smirked at us. I believe I blushed.

‘I hate to interrupt but I just wanted to wish you good luck with the interview, Inspector. I’m sure you’ll be most impressive.’

I left for Sligo soon after, driving slowly enough to stay well behind Miriam. At the Regional HQ I was directed into a small waiting room, in which two other Inspectors were already sitting. Though we didn’t know one another, we shared small talk to dispel our nerves, while trying to forget that we were competing for the same spots on the promotions list. The elder of the two, a man from Downings, told me it was his fifth time before the panel. The younger, from Sligo, was up for his third attempt. When I told them it was my first they laughed and visibly relaxed. The Sligo man was called into the adjoining room where the panel were sitting, and I took the opportunity to nip outside for a smoke. By the time I returned, the Downings man was being led into the room. He winked at me as he closed the door behind him.

Finally, fifteen minutes later, I was called in.

The panel consisted of three people, Deputy Commissioner Jim Garrison and two civilian members: Miriam Powell, and a man whose name I couldn’t catch, who worked for Aer Lingus.

‘Inspector Devlin is one of Lifford’s most well-respected officers,’ Miriam began by way of introduction. ‘I know he takes his work very personally.’

Then the questions began.

Generally, they asked about basic stuff: crime numbers, beat support for detective work, clearance rates, motivating staff and balancing budgets. Inevitably, however, the questioning turned to recent activities.

‘Things seem a little out of control up there at the moment, Inspector,’ the airline manager said. ‘Quite a number of killings — no arrests as such. It’s a bit of a wild frontier you’re policing.’

‘NBCI are coming in today to assist us with the investigations,’ I said. ‘Besides, we’re very hopeful for a breakthrough very soon. We’re closing in on one of the killers; I’m confident we’ll get him in the coming days.’

‘Drafting in NBCI,’ he replied. ‘You’re happy with that? Being able to delegate; ask for help when needed?’

I was unsure whether it was a question or a statement, so I said nothing, in case he hadn’t finished.

‘I’m sure Inspector Devlin has done his best,’ Miriam countered. ‘All things considered.’

The other two nodded silently and looked at me. I felt my panic begin to rise again as I realized I couldn’t just get up and walk out. I felt trapped, was finding it difficult to swallow, as though something were lodged in my throat.

Then Deputy Commissioner Garrison spoke. ‘Some concern has been expressed over these guns and drugs finds over the past months. Some reservations about the validity of the finds. Any comments, Inspector?’

I took a deep breath, swallowed hard and began to speak.

When I got outside, I felt exhausted, my muscles aching as if after an hour’s workout. I called Debbie to let her know how it had gone while I had a smoke. Then I got back on the road, planning to grab some lunch when I reached Lifford station. Any chance of a break was soon lost, though. Caroline Williams was sitting in our office, working through the case files with three men who introduced themselves as detectives from NBCI.

The most senior, Inspector Donal Dempsey, stood up and shook hands, before introducing his colleagues — Sergeants Tommy Deegan and Adam Meaney.

Dempsey nodded towards my clothes; ‘We don’t dress this well in Dublin. Is it formal here or something?’

‘No, I. . I had an interview,’ I explained.

He nodded and smiled. ‘I’m only taking the piss — Caroline here told us already.’

‘Oh,’ I replied, returning the smile.

‘Well,’ he said, rubbing his hands together. ‘Caroline has gone over the case with us too; we’ll handle the Kerr and Webb killings, as they seem to be connected. You can concentrate on the Duffy killing.’

‘Doherty,’ I corrected. ‘Karen Doherty.’

‘Sure, Doherty. Sorry,’ he said. ‘You okay with that division?’ Before I had a chance to answer, he continued, ‘Of course, we’re not here to step on anyone’s toes. Think of us as an extra resource.’

‘Okay,’ I said.

‘In fact, we can get moving fairly quick. Caroline also tells us an anonymous tip was phoned in this morning. Someone claims to have seen Kerr in a car with this O’Kane character who was bonking Webb’s wife. Seems like a good place to start.’

‘Absolutely,’ I agreed. ‘Sergeant Williams and I have work to do on the Doherty case anyway.’

‘Oh,’ Dempsey said, nervously and looking around the room at the others. ‘I’m afraid we were going to bring Caroline along with us — a liaison. Is that okay?’

Caroline looked at me and smiled uncertainly. She widened her eyes a little in recognition of the awkwardness of the situation and the unapologetic manner in which this team had taken over our cases.

‘I believe that decision lies with Caroline,’ I said.

‘How about we give you two a moment or two alone. I can see this has all happened a little quickly for you,’ Dempsey said, earning grins from his two stooges.

‘Jesus, what a creep,’ Caroline said when they had closed the door behind them. ‘How did the interview go?’ she asked.

‘Shit,’ I said. ‘Like this whole fucking morning.’

‘What do we do? Do you want me to stay with you? What do you think, boss?’

‘It’s up to you, Caroline. It’ll do your career no harm at all to have experience working with NBCI. Plus, it means we can keep some kind of contact with the case. Otherwise, I think we’ll never hear anything.’

‘Are you sure?’ she said.

‘I think you should,’ I said, then added, ‘and thanks for earlier.’

‘Oh, that,’ she said, dismissing the words with a wave of her hand.

On her way out she stopped and turned to me. Something was on her mind and she was clearly thinking of how best to express it. Finally she said, ‘You didn’t seem too surprised by the tip-off about O’Kane’s car, sir.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘I suppose I didn’t, Caroline.’

I tried several of the gyms that afternoon, questioning owners and fitness instructors, but no one was able to help in my search for a possible boxer with a tattoo of Cuchulain. Finally, I called Jim Hendry and left a message, asking him if he knew anyone in the Strabane gyms who might be able to help. On my way back to the station, I stopped at a florist’s and bought a bunch of carnations. I drove on to Gallows Lane and stopped outside the house where Kerr had been found. In the back garden I laid a bunch of flowers at the base of the tree to which he had been nailed and whose branches were still stained with his blood. There were no other flowers or messages there. And I prayed quietly for the repose of James’s soul, and for forgiveness for the mess I had made of all the cases I had unsuccessfully juggled over the past weeks.

As I stood, I became aware of a figure to my right. Absurdly, for just a second, the idea struck me that it might be Jamie Kerr. I shuddered away the goose-bumps that had risen with the thought. It was not, however, Kerr. The man who stood in front of me was tall, his head docked like a monk’s, his face flushed with burst blood vessels, his nose bulbous and red with years of drinking. His forehead was tall and heavy browed, his eyes hooded and difficult to read. He wore a tan shirt, a tie hanging loosely round his neck. At the collar line I could make out the ragged edges of a scar.

My initial thought was that he was a mourner, here to pay his respects as I was. But he carried no flowers. Perhaps a journalist, then. But he had no camera, no notebook. I thought of Christy Ward’s comment about his mysterious visitor and the pieces fell into place.

‘Mr Bond,’ I stated. ‘Nice to meet you.’

‘And you, Inspector,’ he said, smiling lightly in recognition of my having identified him. ‘I’ve been tailing you for a while. I thought I’d never get a moment alone with you.’

‘I was playing hard to get,’ I said.

‘You shouldn’t,’ he cautioned. ‘You might win.’

I tired of the exchange and got straight to the point. ‘Did you have anything to do with the killing of Peter Webb?’ I asked.

He nodded once. ‘No,’ he said.’ Far from it. We were the ones got him out of that arms charge.’

‘Why?’

‘You don’t need to know everything about Webb, Inspector,’ he said. ‘But I will tell you what I can. Peter Webb was an informer in the 1970s. Moved over here, played the whole anti-English thing. Wasn’t much use, to be honest. His handler died in the late nineties — had a heart attack — and I took over. I had almost no dealings with the man. He was given my number as a contact, if he ever heard anything, or needed anything. In fact, the first time I saw him in years was just a couple of weeks ago, after he was lifted with that guns find. Called me and asked for our help.’

I nodded my head, but did not speak. After a second, Bond continued. ‘He had nothing to do with those guns, you know.’

‘So I believe,’ I said. Bond angled his head slightly, as a bird might, as if trying to tease out the meaning of my words. ‘What about Jamie Kerr?’ I asked.

Bond stared blankly at me. ‘Never heard of him.’

‘You visited Webb the night he died, though, didn’t you?’ I said.

He nodded. ‘Didn’t even know where he lived, for Christ’s sake. We met for a drink, Webb went through the whole guns thing with me; that was that.’

‘Webb was named as a suspect in the Castlederg Post Office robbery in 1996. Do you know anything about that?’

‘Nothing.’

‘I believe one or more of the gang members killed both Webb and Jamie Kerr.’

Bond pointed towards the tree in front of us. ‘I know the name now; the guy who was crucified.’

‘Webb and Kerr were part of a gang. Both are dead now and there are two gang members left.’

‘I can check the files in Strabane, if you want,’ Bond offered casually; so casually, in fact, that I didn’t realize it was a trap until I walked into it.

‘No point; the important bits are missing,’ I said bitterly.

‘Now, how would you know that, Inspector?’ Bond asked, his voice betraying a sharper edge than before. I began to suspect that I had underestimated the man.

I ignored the question. ‘Why would that be done?’

The man didn’t miss a beat. ‘To protect our sources, I’d say. Now, who showed you our files?’

Neither of us spoke for a moment or two. I said a final prayer for Jamie Kerr and turned to leave. ‘It was nice to meet you, Mr Bond,’ I said, extending my hand.

‘Likewise,’ he replied. ‘I’ve told you as much as I can, Inspector. Webb had nothing to do with those guns. And I can tell you nothing about Castlederg Post Office.’

‘Was he involved in anything serious enough that someone might come back and kill him?’ I asked.

‘Nothing,’ Bond said. ‘In his thirty years here I don’t think he managed one big break.’

‘Not much of a spy, then, was he?’ I said.

‘Not much of anything,’ Bond agreed. ‘The only information he told me of interest the night he died was that someone was bopping his missus.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘We’ve figured that much out ourselves.’

Bond shrugged at me helplessly, then turned to face the flowers I’d placed where Jamie Kerr died. I turned again and walked towards the side of the house, my hands in my pockets.

Bond called after me, ‘I’ll tell Jim Hendry you were asking for him.’

I did not look back.

When I returned to the station, Donal Dempsey and his two sergeants were in the car park having systematically stripped the interior out of a green Toyota Celica. The seats stood side by side against a wall, while Dempsey, in paper forensics suit, stood smoking a cigarette, occasionally shaking his head and wiping the sheen of sweat from his face.

Caroline stood to one side, watching, her arms folded, her expression impossible to read behind her sunglasses as I told her about my meeting with Mr Bond. I could see her roll her eyes when I told her that was the name he had given me. ‘Men,’ she said.

Several other members of the station stood against the wall, watching silently, or calling instructions and encouragement, cheering when the odd piece of interior was thrown out on to the ground.

‘What’s going on?’ I asked.

‘The tip-off we got this morning said Kerr had been spotted in Declan O’Kane’s car. The Dublin boys here have just impounded said vehicle and are currently taking it apart looking for forensics.’

Dempsey came over, tearing open the paper suit and stepping out of it.

‘Feckin’ waste of time, that’s what. We’ve gone through it with a fine-tooth comb. Nothing. It’s clean as a whistle; you’d swear the bastard had it valeted before we arrived. We found nothing.’ he repeated and spat on the ground in disgust.

‘Maybe’, I said, nodding towards the wreck, ‘that’s because that’s not Declan O’Kane’s car.’

It transpired fairly quickly that Dempsey and the NBCI squad had landed at O’Kane’s and served the search warrant they had secured.

‘Is that your car?’ they’d asked Decko, pointing to the green Celica sitting on his driveway.

‘Yes, it is,’ he’d replied, with some degree of honesty.

And so they’d lifted the green car and taken it with them, not realizing that it was, in fact, a second-hand car traded in at his dealership and which he was using for the day.

Williams told me all this later, though she was unable to describe the return trip to Decko’s and the appropriation of the correct, red Ford Puma, as Dempsey told her he didn’t need her, suspecting, perhaps, that she had known all along that they were dismantling the wrong car.

And so, three hours later, having rebuilt the green Toyota Celica and swearing violently through their embarrassment, the NBCI team arrived back at the station with Decko’s red Puma. Within five minutes, without removing any seats, and with a significantly smaller audience, they discovered the religious tract I had placed in the passenger door pocket. A quick phone call to Charles Bardwell confirmed that it was indeed the property of James Kerr.

By eight-thirty that night, Decko O’Kane was in custody, protesting his innocence and shouting from the holding cell that he’d been framed. For my part, I went home to my wife and children and tried to forget all that had happened, attempting to ignore the guilt and unease that gnawed at my guts over the whole Decko affair. All that was needed was for his DNA to match that found under Kerr’s fingernails, I told myself, and my small deception would yield a big result.