Shadow Sins (DCI Wilson Book 2) (17 page)

CHAPTER 40

Comber is a small town of some 8000 souls nestled at the end of an inlet on the landside of Strangford Lough facing the Ards Peninsula to the East of Belfast. The road from Belfast runs through Knock and Dundonald before reaching the shore of the Lough at Comber.

Wilson was in full-dress uniform. The three diamond-shaped flashes on his epaulettes signifying his rank as a Chief Inspector. Kate stood beside him dressed in black as they looked out on the white horses being whipped up by the wind on Strangford Lough. Joseph Worthington grew up in Comber, and he would be laid to rest in the small Roselawn Cemetery in nearby Ballygowan. Wilson and Kate had travelled to Comber together and now stood waiting to join the funeral cortege as it made its way to the graveyard.

Wilson liked the feel of the salt spray laden wind whipping his face. Kate linked her arm in his as they both faced into the wind. He turned and looked at her. Black suited her. It was one of her colours. He was grateful for her presence. On this day he knew he would not have many friends. The visit of the officers from Professional Standards had not gone unobserved by the general population of coppers, and despite the fact that they had been sent packing with no hint of impropriety on his part, he was aware that there was a feeling in the Station that he was somehow at fault for what happened at the Worthington house. That was something that he was going to have to live with. He had never been one of the boys, and he had always known that there would be a price to pay for his refusal to join the Orange Lodge and the Masons. Wilson had checked the route of the cortege and intended to join it just before it entered Roselawn Cemetery. This was not a day for confrontation and the last thing he wanted was to be the source of any antagonism. Worthington’s family had a heavy enough cross to bear without him adding to it.

“Bracing to say the least,” Kate snuggled closer to him.

A spit of rain added itself to the sea spray. “Why is the weather always crap when there’s a funeral?” Wilson asked more to himself than to Kate.

“It just seems to be that way,” she turned to face him. “Isn’t it about time we made a move?”

“Aye,” Wilson said before moving reluctantly. He could have spent a few more hours staring at the sea and feeling the wind lashing his face. There was a certain serenity in watching the waters of the Lough brush against the land. He checked his watch. The cortege should be nearly at the Cemetery. They walked to Kate’s Mercedes for the short drive to Ballygowan.

Traffic ground to a standstill as they approached the village of Ballygowan. The PSNI had taken over the town for the burial of one of their own. Wilson’s uniform accelerated their entry to the village, and they parked at the first available spot indicated by a traffic policeman.

The village was wall to wall with PSNI policemen. Joe Worthington had a long career and had worked in a number of Stations all of whom had sent representatives. Wilson and Kate made their way through the crowd until they got within sight of the mourning party consisting of Worthington’s wife and children, his brothers and sisters and attendant nieces and nephews. To the side of the main party was the VIP group of senior officers led by the Chief Constable, two Deputy Chief Constables and other notables. DCC Jennings was at the Chief Constables arm drooling over every word that issued from the Great Man’s mouth. Wilson smiled. Making a career in policing was not entirely dependent on the ability to catch criminals. None of the senior officers appeared to notice him although he assumed that this was on purpose. He had no intention of insinuating himself into their group. He was there to pay his last respects to one of his colleagues not to lick someone’s bum.  He manoeuvred Kate to the side so that they would be out of sight of the main mourning party. They found a place under a tree some fifty feet from the graveside. Wilson watched the black-clad group begin to make their way to the grave. A young man detached himself from the crowd and made his way to where Wilson was standing.

“You’re DCI Wilson?” the young man said.

“That I am,” Wilson said.

“I’m Alan Worthington. My mother pointed you out.”

“I’m sorry for your trouble,” Wilson said extending his hand.

The young man ignored the extended hand. “You have some brass turning up here to-day. You’re the man who’s responsible for my father’s death.”

“I came to pay my respects to your father. I’m not looking for trouble, and I don’t think that getting into an argument is the correct way to honour your father’s memory. I would be more than happy to discuss whatever issues you may have with me whenever you want. I always find that it’s better to hear every side of the story before you come to any conclusions.”

“You’re forgetting my mother was there. She witnessed everything.”

“I’m available at your convenience. I respected your father and I wouldn’t have been at his house, unless I was ordered to be there. Now I think that you should join your family. I have no intention of intruding on your grief, but when you, or indeed, any of your family are ready. I will be happy to give my side of the story.”

“My father liked you,” Alan Worthington said. “He said that you were the most honest copper he ever met.”

“Your father was a good judge of character,” Kate interjected.

“I’m sorry, DCI Wilson. You’re welcome to stay, but I would prefer if you stayed out of my mother’s way. I’ll take you up on your offer to discuss my father’s death. However, I would consider it a favour if you didn’t join us after the interment. My mother’s grief is still raw.”

Wilson simply touched his cap in a salute.

Wilson watched the young man re-join the mourning party. The pastor had already started his prayers, and Wilson noticed one of the Chief Constable’s assistants passing over the copy of the speech to his boss.

“What utter bullshit,” he said under his breath to Kate. “Less than a week ago, they were ready to hang the poor bastard out to dry. They were going to make an example of him for the good people of Northern Ireland. Today he’s going to be a paragon of virtue. Shame on them, the filthy hypocrites.”

Moira was thinking that she would have to see an optician when this job was over. She was on the second disk and the quality was if anything lower than the first. Either that was the case or he eyes really were on the blink. So far, nothing. Wilson was right. Police work was plod, plod, plod. Looking at the evidence then looking at it again to see if you missed anything. She flinched when she thought that she might have to go over the CCTV disks again. Today was the day to launch a criminal enterprise in Belfast District. Half the Station was in Ballygowan for the Super’s funeral. She only assumed that other Stations in the Province would be similarly denuded. She picked up her cup of coffee and took a slug of the contents. The stuff from the canteen was bad enough when it was boiling hot but cold it was enough to turn your stomach. Just at the moment she returned to watching the screen she saw what she might be looking for. The image was indistinct and grainy, but it was undoubtedly the picture of a man on the lowest rung of Belfast society. He slouched rather than walked upright. She allowed the picture to go on and the second time-lapsed picture showed only his back. She paused the DVD recorder and returned to the one image that showed the man. He wore the now ubiquitous hoodie and his face was almost totally covered by the hood. He looked to be somewhat below average build, but she couldn’t make out any distinguishing marks. She zoomed in on the figure, but the image became even more indistinct. The individual pixels that made up the face were discernible, but they did nothing to improve the quality of the image. She would have to pass this along to the experts but even then she doubted if they would be able to do anything with the image. She looked at the time stamp on the screen and made a note. She made a copy of the image and returned to trawling through the disk.  It might be a lead but there was no certainty that the grainy image was her man.

Noel Mulholland was wrapped up in his sleeping bag in his living room in the old Victorian girl’s school. His head was pounding. He had already taken a Vicodin tablet, but the pain had not reduced. He tried to remember whether he had actually killed Gilroy and the other priest or whether he had just been present and someone else had done the actual killing. Hard as he tried he couldn’t remember exactly the circumstances of both deaths. He removed the knife from the folds of his hooded jacket and slid his finger along the razor-sharp edge. This was undoubtedly the knife that had killed Gilroy and the other priest whose name he could not now remember. There was only one more who would have to die and maybe then the headaches would stop, and he would become normal again. He looked around at his filthy surroundings. Being normal again was out of the question. He hadn’t worked in years, and he had no skills to offer. Sooner or later the police would catch up with him, and he would be done for the killing of Gilroy and the other priest. They would take his pills from him, and they would put him in jail. He had already been there and had been forced to carry out unspeakable sexual acts for some of the more brutish prisoners. A tear ran out of the corner of his left eye. The headache was beginning to recede, but it was being replaced by a feeling of abject fear. He was going to jail. He bundled himself up more tightly in his sleeping bag. “Mammy,” he said softly and closed his eyes. He tried to picture his mother who had long ago abandoned him. “Mammy, I love you,” he said as tears ran down his cheeks. He could see her in his mind’s eye. Her round kind face topped by a head of curly red hair. She wore a print dress and held her two arms out to him. He wanted to run to her but when he moved his legs, he felt the restrictions of the sleeping bag. “I did nothing wrong,” he said softly. “I did nothing wrong,” he shouted as the apparition began to fade before his eyes.

Wilson’s humour was black as he entered the Squad Room. Moira was the only one in the room. The other members of his team would be in some hostelry or other at the post-funeral drink. He wanted to attend because he knew he had played no part in what had happened to Joe. In the end, he had listened to Kate’s council and returned to the semi-deserted station. He had changed out of his dress uniform and was dressed in a dark-blue Canali suit. Kate insisted that he jettison his old clothes when he decided to sell his house. The furniture and the clothes found a new home in the Oxfam shop. He had never spent more than 150 pounds on a suit but he was currently wearing a costume that cost more than the entire wardrobe he jettisoned. The problem for him was that he liked his new wardrobe. The suit fitted like a glove, and he had noticed that people, including some of his superiors, seemed to have a more positive opinion of him since he had started to dress like George Clooney. He removed his jacket and put it carefully on the hanger on the wall behind his office chair. His door was closed, and it was going to stay that way for a few hours at least. Kate had wanted to take him to lunch after the funeral, but he wasn’t hungry.  The Chief Super was right. He loved this job, and he was bloody damn good at it. The question was could he handle the crap along with the part of the job that he loved. He wanted to concentrate on catching the killer of the two priests. It was always solving the puzzle that intrigued him. Putting the pieces together to form the whole picture that would inevitably lead to identifying the killer. There were two elements that were clear to him. The first was that it wasn’t sectarian. He was convinced that the burning of the church was not the primary crime. Simpson and Rice were not part of that deduction. He wouldn’t believe the Lord’s Prayer if it was uttered by those two. They were such consummate liars that they would lie their way into heaven when they got there. The church burning was simply collateral to the immolation of the priest. The second point was that the victims had not been chosen at random. Somewhere in their background was the reason they had been chosen to die. If they had been ordinary citizens, he would have been able to build up a picture of what bound them together but their common past must surely have been something, which was connected with their being clergymen and that avenue of investigation was being closed off to him.  He was sure the answer to the motive lay in them being priests. The question for him was how he was going to go about finding that link.

Devlin yawned as he opened the last batch of diocesan papers. There was no doubt in his mind that he was on a fool’s errand. He had scanned thousands of documents from the most mundane to the description of manoeuvrings by various Bishops that might have landed them in jail. He was more convinced than ever that there was no link between Fathers Gilroy and Reilly. The mountain of documents surrounding his desk yielded no mention of either priest. He discarded the blue ribbon that bound the final batch of papers and instantly felt a shiver run down his spine. He turned and looked behind him to see if he had left a window or door open. He was alone in a closed study. Two documents into the pack he found what he had been looking for. The title of the document was - ‘A review of the Clerical Inquiry into the Activities of Father John Gilroy’. He felt bile rise in his mouth. The material that he had collected from the Rectory at Saint Cormac’s had left him in no doubt about the sexual proclivities of Father Gilroy. He now realised that he should have carried out a more detailed examination of Father Gilroy’s past. He opened the first page of the report and looked at the date on the bottom. The Clerical Inquiry took place on the 20
th
of October 1997. This was easily within the timeframe when the Church in Ireland was well aware of the abuse that children were experiencing. With a certain amount of trepidation, he turned over the next page of the report. The document had been prepared and signed by Monsignor Carey. The same individual was now his superior, Bishop Carey. One of the priests on the Inquiry was Father Fergus Reilly. Devlin’s heart sunk to his boots. He had finally found the link between the two victims, but he had the distinct feeling that it would have been better if the document now in his hands had never been found. He started reading the details of the Clerical Inquiry into Father Gilroy’s activities. He was almost afraid of what he was going to find. He quickly noted the two other names on the Inquiry. One was a priest, and the second was a layman. He brought up the list of priests currently active in Ireland and typed in the name from the Inquiry. Nothing. The second member of the Inquiry was no longer listed as a priest that meant he had either left the country, or the priesthood, or he was dead. He made a quick note to follow up. The layman was another issue. He rubbed his hand together as he decided on his next course of action. If he read the contents of the Clerical Inquiry, and if there was any impropriety, he would then become an accessory after the fact. However, the report probably only existed in one copy, and he had that copy. It had lain in the diocesan records for the past sixteen years without resurfacing. Therefore, if it were to find its way into the locked drawer of his desk, there would be little or no chance of it resurfacing. Depending on the contents it could provide him with some leverage with the Bishop and enhance his career. He flicked over the opening page and began to read.