Death at Whitewater Church Read online

  “Crane,” she said.

  “I’m sorry. Mrs. Crane.”

  “It’s fine. I’ve never dealt with you before. We’ve always used Keavney’s,” she said, referring to the other solicitor’s firm in the town. “But Alan thought, after we met you last night … in the circumstances, since you weren’t around when he went missing, well, that maybe you might be the one to talk to.”

  “I presume we’re talking about Conor?”

  She nodded. “I know the Devitts use Keavney’s, too. And what with everything that’s happened, I wanted to be discreet. I have no wish to be insensitive.”

  “What is it that you want?” I asked.

  She appeared to choose her words carefully. “I want to know when he can be declared legally dead.”

  I leaned back in my seat to gather my thoughts. “Okay,” I said, “under the law here, a missing person is presumed alive for seven years. After seven years he is presumed dead.”

  “That’s what I thought,” she said. “So, we’re nearly there.”

  “When did you last see him?”

  “The fifteenth of June, seven years ago this summer. The day before our wedding.”

  I took out an attendance sheet and wrote down the date.

  “So, I can do it this summer? Have him declared dead?”

  “In theory, yes. But it’s not quite as simple as that. I’ll have to look into it but I think it can be quite complicated, in fact. It involves an application to the High Court.”

  She sat forward. “Yes?”

  “Probably with an affidavit. And even though you were his fiancée, you may not be able to do it on your own. We may need a relative – a blood relative.” I paused. “So you may need to involve the Devitts, whether you want to or not.”

  Her face fell.

  “Is there any particular reason why you want to do it?”

  She delivered her response like a well-rehearsed answer to a question in an oral exam. “Conor and I built a house. It’s in our joint names, and I need to have his name taken off it.”

  “Very well.” I returned to the attendance sheet and started to take some notes. “How were you registered, can you remember? What type of joint ownership?”

  “Joint tenants. I’m sure of it. We were asked what way we wanted it.”

  I was surprised. It’s not a question clients can usually answer so easily. I said as much.

  She shrugged. “I’m in charge of mortgages at the bank.”

  “So, if Conor is declared presumed dead, you will inherit.”

  A look of displeasure crossed her face. “That’s not why I want it done.”

  I put down my pen. “I’m sorry. Why is it you want it done, then?”

  Her face hardened. It made her look older. “I want him out of my life. It’s been over for a long time, and I don’t want to have to think about him anymore. I want to stop getting letters from the bank addressed to Conor Devitt and Lisa McCauley, letters from the Revenue Commissioners about property tax, letters about God knows what.” Her accent seemed to get stronger as her voice grew louder. “I’m blue in the face asking them to change it, but they haven’t a notion of doing it while they can’t be sure if he’s dead or alive. I can’t live in limbo any longer. This whole thing’s been going on for long enough.”

  “I understand,” I said.

  “I want it over and done with. He’s gone and that should be it.”

  “Especially now that you’re married to someone else.”

  “Alan’s got nothing to do with it. I was full sure I was going to do something about it when I came home from the holiday, but then when that body was found and everyone seemed to think it might be him, I thought maybe it would be over and done with that way. And what with the break-in and all, I didn’t feel like doing anything about it, anyway. But then when it wasn’t him …”

  I interrupted her. “Did you think it might be?”

  “I didn’t know,” she said firmly.

  “So, you’re not hopeful of him being found alive, then?”

  A look of fury flashed across her face. It was the same look I had seen the night before.

  “Hopeful? You are joking, aren’t you? If that man is alive, he’s downright humiliated me. Have you any idea of what it’s like to be stood up on your wedding day? To have relatives over from America and England and God knows where, spending everything you have on your dream wedding only for the groom not to bother turning up?”

  “No, I don’t,” I said quietly.

  “Well, then.” She sat back in her seat.

  “Have you talked to his family about what you’re intending doing? Claire, or his mother?”

  She shook her head.

  “They might have some feelings about it, you know. They’ve just lost Danny.”

  “I know that.”

  “Well, as I said, you may need them for the application. But even if you don’t, I still think you should discuss it with them.”

  Lisa sighed.

  “You never know,” I said gently, “they may be in agreement with you. I understand they’re convinced something must have happened to him. They don’t believe that he left of his own accord.”

  “They wouldn’t believe he put a foot wrong, so they wouldn’t,” she muttered. “Claire thought the sun shone out of his arse. Did anything he told her to do. And his mother was the same.”

  “What do you think happened?”

  She sighed again. “To be truthful, I don’t know. Things weren’t right for a while, I know that much.”

  “Between the two of you?”

  She shot me a warning look. “It’s not something I want said, mind.”

  “Of course. Anything you say to me is confidential.”

  She hesitated. “He was behaving a wee bit off. I don’t know what was going on, but he’d disappear for hours on end, turning his phone off so I couldn’t get him.”

  “What do you think it was?”

  She looked at me. “You’re thinking he was cheating on me?”

  “No, I …”

  “Well, maybe you’re right. I’ve no proof, but maybe you’re right. Conor Devitt was the kind of man women like, if you know what I mean?”

  I knew exactly what she meant.

  “Even my mother liked him,” she said. “My grandmother used to flirt with him and she’s eighty-two.” She smiled for the first time since she’d come in. “That should have been a warning sign. My grandmother’s a right old battleaxe. She didn’t even mind that he didn’t go to Mass.”

  It was my turn to smile.

  Her expression became sad. “We were together for a long time, you know? He was the first serious boyfriend I had. A few years older than me, good job, great football player. Sure, I was mad about him. But I never really trusted him. Strange, that.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know. He was too good to be true. Handsome and sensible. You don’t get that combination in one fella. Especially not in his twenties. There had to be something wrong.”

  “How long were you with him?” I tried to calculate in my head.

  “Nine years,” she said. “All the years when I should have been having a family.” Her eyes welled. She shook the tears away impatiently.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  She looked down at her hands. A large solitaire diamond, a wedding ring, nails bitten to the quick. “I don’t know why I waited so long. I think in my heart I knew he didn’t want to get married. But I never thought he’d do that to me, just not turn up. That was cruel.”

  I was beginning to feel sympathy for her when her voice hardened again, as if she regretted her show of emotion.

  “The dress, the flowers, the hotel, the band, the photographer.” She counted them all off on her fingers. “The best of everything we had. I wouldn’t have any crap. A video man down from Derry. Doves, for Christ’s sake.”

  I tried not to smile.

  “All paid for. And the morning of my wedding I’m being driv
en round and round the town like a tool for a full hour.” Her eyes watered again. “He broke my heart. At first I was worried, then when he didn’t appear in the days after that …”

  “Then?” I prompted.

  She clammed up. “Nothing.”

  “Are you saying you don’t think he is dead?”

  “Like I said, I don’t know,” she answered sullenly.

  “If you have any reason to believe he’s still alive, Mrs. Crane, you’ll have to tell me. It may cause a difficulty in obtaining a declaration of presumed death,” I warned her. “Everything will have to go into the affidavit.”

  “I don’t. I don’t know what happened to him and that’s the truth,” she said firmly. Her expression didn’t change as she leaned forward, fixed me with a resolute gaze, and said, “So, are you going to help me get rid of the bastard or not?”

  Chapter 16

  I OPENED THE door to clear the cloud of perfume lingering in the air. It was way too cold to open a window. There was something about Lisa Crane I couldn’t warm to. Something cloying, a bit like her scent. Strange, because when I had heard the story of her fiancé’s disappearance before their wedding, I had felt sorry for her. But she was hard to like. I wondered if that was intentional on her part. I’m a woman, and Lisa Crane was a man’s woman. Or at least she wanted to be.

  There was a brittle quality to her that she covered with aggression. I thought about how thin the line is between love and hate, how quickly one can turn to the other when someone’s trust is betrayed. What was it that she wasn’t telling me, I wondered.

  The morning passed in a series of appointments. At one o’clock, after a message from Liam, I thought I’d call Raymond Kelly to confirm his instructions about the sale and get Paul Doherty back up to Whitewater Church to finish the survey. I was halfway through dialing Kelly’s number when it occurred to me that I should talk to Molloy first to ensure that we had access. I dialed the garda station and got McFadden.

  “Is the sergeant there, Andy?”

  “No. Can I help you with something?”

  “Maybe. I wanted to make sure your crime scene people are completely finished up at the church. We need access.”

  “Aye, I think so. I believe they finished last week. Why do you need access?”

  “Well, it looks as if the buyers are going ahead after all and we need to get the place surveyed again.”

  He whistled. “Jesus. They’re brave wee souls. There’s no accounting for taste.”

  “It is a beautiful setting,” I said.

  “Well, you couldn’t pay me to live there.”

  “I know what you mean. Anyway, you’re all finished with

  it?”

  “Just to make sure, I’ll give them a call up in Letterkenny and I’ll ring you back before two o’clock. That do you?”

  “That’d be great, Andy. Thanks.” I hesitated. “Where’s Molloy, by the way?”

  I could hear the mischief in his voice when he replied, “He’s gone off to have lunch with his lady friend.”

  “She’s still here?” I could feel the pins and needles traveling slowly up my neck again.

  “Aye, she stayed an extra day to do the postmortem on poor Danny yesterday afternoon. I think she’s heading back tonight.”

  I hung up the phone and stared at the wall. I couldn’t figure out what was making me so bloody uncomfortable – the identity of this pathologist Laura Callan and her place in my past, or the fact that Molloy was spending so much time with her, and in such a fashion that McFadden was calling her his lady friend.

  Whatever it was, I hated it. Every time her name was mentioned, I started to think about things I didn’t want to think about. I wished her gone – far away from here.

  I couldn’t face a sandwich. So I stayed at my desk over lunch. Stewing.

  Leah arrived back at a quarter to two as I was making myself a quick coffee. She shoved her bag under her desk, asking, “So, how did you get on with our Lisa?”

  “Okay. I met her last night at the wake.”

  She smiled.

  I rested my mug on the counter. “You seem to have a view on her. Spit it out.”

  She shook her head. “Ach, it’s nothing really.”

  “Go on.”

  “She’s just a bit possessive, always has been – every woman’s a threat, if you know what I mean.”

  “You sound like you’re talking from experience.”

  She looked embarrassed. “Maybe. Anyway, it looks as if she’s met her match. Her husband came in after her and waited for her down here the whole time she was in with you.”

  “Alan?”

  “Yes. Walked her out the door by the arm. Very proprietorial. Oh, and by the way, I ran into Mick Bourke in the town. He wants to know if he can see you tomorrow afternoon after the funeral.”

  “That’s fine. Give him a call back and stick him in wherever there’s a window. Did he say what it’s about?”

  “No, but he was a bit jittery. As if he didn’t want anyone to see him talking to me.”

  Leah took a slip of paper out of her bag and picked up the phone to dial. She stopped halfway through and placed the phone to her chest.

  “Oh, I nearly forgot to tell you.”

  “Something else? You’ve had a busy time.”

  “There’s been another break-in. Paul Doherty – his office.”

  “Oh no! When?”

  “Last night or this morning. Two computers and some engineering equipment were stolen – mobile phone, too, I think. The postman told me.”

  “No cash or anything?”

  “No. But Paul’s furious.”

  “I bet. I hope he’s insured.”

  I didn’t like the apprehensive feeling I had walking in the door of the garda station. I wasn’t used to it. This was my turf; I had walked through these doors hundreds of times. I resented the fact that I felt uncomfortable now and I resented the person who was making me feel that way.

  Luckily, she wasn’t there. Molloy and McFadden were on their own, squabbling about something. The atmosphere was tense. I had to add to it, of course.

  “How was your lunch?” I asked.

  Molloy gave McFadden a glare. McFadden reddened and stared intently at the statement he was typing. Immediately, I felt guilty.

  “Fine. How was yours?” Molloy replied, approaching the desk.

  “I didn’t have any.”

  The words hadn’t sounded sulky when I formulated them in my head, but when they came out of my mouth I realized I sounded like a five-year-old. Molloy gave no indication that he’d noticed.

  “Andy tells me that your buyers are back and you want to have the church surveyed again.”

  I nodded.

  “That’s fine. All the evidence has been collected according to the Garda Technical Bureau. It’s a matter of carrying out the tests now, and that’s going to take some time.”

  “No cause of death yet?”

  “Still up in the air.”

  The door opened behind me. It was Paul Doherty, stubbing out a cigarette. The burglary had obviously induced his emergency smoking again.

  “I’m here to give you that statement,” he said.

  “Andy, can you?” Molloy nodded at McFadden.

  “Sorry to hear about the break-in, Paul,” I said.

  “Thanks. Could have done without it, that’s for sure.”

  I looked at Molloy. “Could I have a quick chat with you?” I asked.

  “Fine.”

  I followed him into the interview room. He shut the door behind us.

  “Any idea yet why Danny Devitt’s DNA was on the blanket?”

  He crossed his arms. “Well, we’ve searched his cottage and it appears both the blanket and pillow came from there. So it does look as though he was the one who wrapped the bones.”

  “Right.” I took a few seconds to digest this. “So where did the bones come from? Do you still think they were moved into the crypt from somewhere else?”

&n
bsp; “We’re not sure,” Molloy said slowly.

  “What about the soil samples?”

  “They match the soil in the old graveyard, which is no indicator of anything,” he said. “The traces were minimal and soil is pretty similar throughout this area.”

  “What about the disturbed soil in the graveyard? Under the trees?”

  Molloy raised his eyebrows.

  “Andy told me. Could they have come from there? A shallow grave?”

  Molloy didn’t reply. Was I imagining it, or was he avoiding my gaze?

  “Could Danny have dug them up and moved them into the crypt?” I asked.

  Molloy shook his head. “Unlikely. The bones were fairly fragile. It’s not as if they would have held together.”

  “I don’t know if it’s relevant, but he had some knowledge of anatomy, I think. Animals, anyway. He was a bit of an unqualified vet.”

  “So I believe. To be honest, even wrapping the bones in the blanket would have been difficult. The pathologist believes that was done relatively recently. Moving a skeleton and having the bones remain intact would have been virtually impossible.”

  It was a macabre image: Danny Devitt in a darkened crypt beneath a deserted church, carefully wrapping a human skeleton in a blanket and placing a pillow beneath the skull. Maybe with his dog in tow. A picture of Fred running away with one of the bones in his mouth crept into my head. I chased it away.

  “Why on earth would he do something like that?”

  “God knows.”

  “And why were the bones there in the first place?” I said again. “I just can’t imagine Danny Devitt killing someone.”

  Molloy looked away. There was something he wasn’t telling me, I could sense it. But I knew better than to push him. Molloy was like a set of tangled Christmas tree lights. The harder you tried to find a way in, the more inaccessible he became. I tried a different approach.

  “You know I told you that he was anxious to know if the bones had been identified?”

  Molloy nodded.

  “Something was confusing him. Something didn’t make sense to him. He said he wanted to talk to me about it and then he changed his mind. Then he wanted to talk to you, but he said there was something he needed to do first. I don’t know what that was.”

  Molloy scratched his chin thoughtfully.