Cherringham: A Deadly Confession (8 page)

He made a note to ask Liam about the place, and then turned to another wall.

Here the pictures were of horses and jockeys, trainers, maps of courses, aerial photos, and newspaper articles with Grand National headlines, Derby Day, the Arc de Triomphe race in France.

In one photo, Eamon stood by a fine horse, a jeroboam of champagne clutched in his big hands. Behind him a line of open stable doors was filled with clapping, smiling stable hands.

On a small bedside cabinet he could see a couple of books, some pens, a stack of racing newspapers.

Jack picked up the paper on the top of the pile — dated just a week ago it was covered in pen scrawls, notes, odds, figures.

Right to the end, Eamon was clearly playing the horses.

The bedside cabinet had a small drawer. Jack opened it, looked inside: hairbrush, cuff-links, a small prayer book. He shut the drawer.

He scanned the big closet in corner of the room, then walked over and opened one of the doors. First, a shelf with a few pairs of standard-issue black shoes, priest shoes. Then he pushed aside hangers with black suits and shirts.

A pair of white collars were draped like horseshoes on the bar.

He checked the suit pockets, one after the other, suit after suit, trousers as well, all turning up empty.

He opened the other door: and this was filled with more suits and jackets and shirts — but not the kind a priest would normally wear.

Tweeds, grey casual, cord jackets. Again Jack checked the pockets. Old train tickets, betting slips, hotel receipts … in one jacket an empty quarter-bottle of Irish whiskey. An unwrapped pack of playing cards.

This was the real Eamon Byrne.

Not exactly a secret life, thought Jack — but certainly one lived well away from the cold strictures of Mother Church.

Then Jack turned back to the chest of drawers, opening each drawer and making sure that amid the socks and underwear he hadn’t missed anything. But he hadn’t.

No meds. No personal papers. Nothing.

Which is what he expected.

Then Jack dropped to his knees — still a bit creaky from that morning’s run with Liam.

Going to be paying for that,
he thought.

He shined the light under the bureau.

A few dust bunnies lingered against the wall, but otherwise — nothing there.

And then he turned to shoot the light under Byrne’s bed.

Which is when he saw something, under the head of the bed, flush against the corner by the wall.

A tan metal box, about two feet square.

He knew it.

A man like Byrne would have to have real secrets, and he’d have to have a place to keep them.

Jack stretched as far as he could under the bed, his fingertips barely reaching. But then he was able to flap at the box’s side and get it to slide a few inches towards him, then a few inches more, until he could grab the handle on top and pull it out.

And he suddenly felt he was about to learn more about Father Byrne than the priest ever wanted anyone to know.

*

But first, there was a lock. And this lock was real. Built into the box, it kept the top latched tight.

The latch could probably be pried open … but it might be more useful left intact.

Right now, Jack didn’t know where this was going to go.

He slid out his Swiss army knife, so useful, which had — among its myriad of tools — a needlepoint item that probably was designed for something other than breaking into things…

But Jack didn’t have a clue what that might be.

He placed his phone on the bed, and sat beside it, the box on his lap.

“Okay,” he said quietly, “let’s see how much trouble you’re going to be…”

He started working the knife’s needle tool into the keyhole. At first, he thought that he would have to use it roughly, just pry the damn metal container open.

But then he felt the tip hit
something
.

“There we are.”

If he could move that locking mechanism, the latch should pop free.

He tried now to use the tool as a lever, pulling it to the left — but that only made whatever purchase he had against the latch slip away.

This wasn’t easy.

Byrne had gotten himself one mighty lockbox.

Again he worked the point in, until he again felt the lock. Now, he tried a different method … pushing down on the mechanism, then to the side.

Slow progress, but it was moving.

Then — with a loud
snap
that sounded thunderous in the oh-so quiet room, the latch popped free.

And as if he was opening Ali Baba’s treasure chest, Jack lifted the top of the metal case.

At first glance, the case looked like anyone’s collection of bills, bank statements, cancelled cheques.

Nothing terribly revealing there, though there seemed to be a lot of different accounts.

But then, Jack thought … if Byrne was having gambling problems, then part of that story might very well be hidden in those statements.

He picked up one, showing the occasional large deposit. And then almost immediately, large withdrawals. Winnings, losings? Or did Byrne sometimes take a big church donation and slip it into his account?

Then, on one set of statements for recent months, Jack saw something else peculiar.

Regular money transfers to someone named Antonio Bell.

As he rifled through the statements, seeing where they occasionally dipped into the red, each statement had at least one such transfer…

Except for the most recent.

The statement for the last month had no transfer to this Bell character.

Whoever Bell was, he hadn’t received any money from Father Byrne
that
month.

Jack pulled everything out of the metal case to see what else was there. He found some letters — which could be looked at later.

Then, at the bottom, a business envelope addressed to Byrne here, at the Rectory.

No return address.

He pried open the envelope and saw a folded sheet of lined, yellow paper, something from a legal pad.

The way the envelope had been stuck at the bottom made Jack wonder whether this was something Byrne wanted hidden?

Or something he wanted to forget.

He pulled the sheet out and unfolded it.

The letters big, the words and message clear.

“Pay up or else, Padre!”

Think I know what the “or else” is,
Jack thought.

Having seen the trap along Byrne’s route, he had to think that maybe the priest fell behind to someone and paid a price for that out on his running track.

He shut the light off on this phone and called Sarah.

“Jack?”

“Hey, Sarah.” He whispered. “Think I found something. Though — not too sure at all what it is.”

“I guess I shouldn’t ask where you are.”

He laughed quietly. “I’m in Byrne’s room. I found a locked case, which I managed to … open. There are some things that might tell us what happened. Bank statements. And a name of someone getting money transfers, Antonio Bell. Can you check that out?”

“I’ll try. Just helping Chloe with some schoolwork, but I should be able to find a minute.”

“And … can I bring the statements to you? Maybe you can make sense of the money going in and out of the account?”

“No problem. Coming now?”

“Yup, just as soon as I—”

He stopped.

A noise.

Barely audible, but from downstairs.

That front door, so easily opened, rattling.

“Jack — what is it?”

He lowered his voice.

“Got company,” he said. “I’d better hide. See you in a bit.”

“Be careful. I’ll wait up.”

And rather than say anything else Jack killed the call.

In seconds, if someone had come into the building, leaving lights off, Jack could guess where they were headed.

Right for this room.

He had to move fast.

Jack stuffed the papers back in the metal box, and then closed the lid gently, pressing that latch in slowly enough so he hoped it wouldn’t make a click.

But
click
it did, the noise so sharp and clear in the total quiet of the room.

Now though, with the case shut, he could move.

He stuck his head out the door.

No shadowy figure moving down the hallway … yet.

He saw the outline of an easy chair down by the nearby hallway window. Thankfully the moon had moved on, so that almost no light lit that end.

The chair might just be big enough, he thought. He
hoped
…

He moved quickly behind the easy chair, and did his best to hide.

Though he knew if someone walked all the way to the window there’d be no way that they wouldn’t see Jack.

Then — he heard the sound of steps making the floorboards creak.

He edged his head to the right … just a bit, so one eye could look down the dark hall.

The dark figure moving slowly, steadily to this end of the hallway.

Jack kept his hands locked on the metal box.

That was the prize; he had to hold onto that. The first real clues they had found in this so-far unfathomable murder.

He pulled his head back; eyes made good reflectors of light.

In moments, he’d know if the person walking this way was headed to Byrne’s room.

The steps closer, the creaking sharper, and finally the person was there.

A click, and a torch went on.

Small, not more than a penlight making a small pool of light.

And Jack risked another quick glance.

To see:

One of the young nuns walking into the room, her light aimed down.

Jack didn’t know her name; they all looked pretty similar with their habits and veil.

The nun and her light vanished into the room.

While Jack waited.

Then he had a thought …
his phone!

After talking to Sarah he hadn’t put it on mute. What if Sarah found out something, and called back?

Don’t,
he thought.

No way he’d be allowed to keep the metal box if he was discovered.

But then, he had to wonder, who was this in Byrne’s room? And what was she looking for?

Maybe for the same thing I have in my hands?

Every now and then a small shaft of light escaped the room as Jack heard drawers opening, then being shut. Then some steps, most likely to the closet.

While Jack waited, breathing steadily, so aware of his phone, afraid to slide the mute button on for fear that even that tiny noise would be tell-tale.

And then, the nun came out of the room, the penlight slicing left and right, almost hitting the chair that Jack hid behind.

But just as it seemed one slice would expose the soles of his shoes, or his legs tucked behind the back of the chair, the light clicked off.

The figure started moving down the hallway.

Empty-handed?

Jack waited a good ten minutes, well after he heard the click of the front door, before he finally attempted to uncurl his stiff body from its hiding place and making some creaks of his own, stood up.

He walked back along the corridor and into Byrne’s room. Switched on his phone light again and he played it around the room. The nun had done a good job — all the closet doors were shut, just as Jack himself had left them.

He was about to turn and go when something by the bedside cabinet caught his eye.

Something was different.

But what?

He played the light slowly across the top of the bedside cabinet. The drawer was slightly open. Jack knew he’d closed it tight, just as he’d found it.

He walked over and slid open the drawer.

There, next to the prayer book was a small bottle of pills.

It hadn’t been there before.

He picked up the bottle. The prescription label showed Eamon Byrne’s name. And the drugs, Jack suspected — would be for the priest’s heart.

Jack knew he would have seen these if they’d been in the bedside drawer when he first looked: the nun must have brought them with her.

Now what the hell did
that
mean?

Jack memorised the name of the drugs, and left the room.

He had the case. And now he had an unanswered question…

Not a bad night’s work.

Now — to let Sarah work her magic on the contents, and the mysterious Antonio Bell.

It was nearly lunch before Sarah had a free half-hour to get back to the case.

Being a parent did have its demands as well…

First, she’d had to give Chloe a lift to school because she was late.

Then, she’d had to repeat the trip because her daughter had forgotten her guitar.

The rest of the hectic morning had been taken up reviewing the web design for a new hotel which was opening up in the village.

Normally Sarah would have left it to her assistant, Grace, but the clients were being incredibly fussy about what they were looking for and — it seemed — needed all of Sarah’s experience to keep them happy.

Jack had phoned twice already and although he was sympathetic she could tell he was itching to get on with the case.

So, while Grace popped out to get them both salads, she found her notepad with all the key words from the investigation into Father Eamon Byrne’s death and started to work out exactly what progress she and Jack had made.

Not much to go on, she realised.

The three retreaters. The mysterious Antonio Bell. Some betting slips. Liam O’Connor. The disappearing and then reappearing meds. And the name of a hospice — what had Jack called it — St. Elrich’s?

Then, there was the box of statements and accounts which Jack had brought over to her house last night just before she’d gone to bed.

She hefted it up onto the desk and took out the piles of paper and old notebooks.

Where to start?

“Tuna or chorizo?” said Grace appearing at the door bearing the salads.

“Tuna,” said Sarah.

Grace grabbed a couple of plates and came and sat next to her.