The Doll's House (18 page)

When Clodagh left Gerard Hayden’s yesterday, she didn’t know I’d been following her. She barely turned as she left his house. Her appointment had lasted longer than I’d expected. She was obviously upset. Clodagh is a woman on the edge, someone who doesn’t require much pushing to topple. I envy how gullible she is. I stopped being gullible a long time ago. I learned that lesson the hard way. Never judge a book by its cover. Never trust. Never walk easily into a trap, because traps are always hidden. Traps are not meant to be seen.

My conversation with Gerard Hayden hadn’t taken long, another communication on a need-to-know basis. He’ll continue to play his game for now. Gerard Hayden is no more than a pawn, the weakest piece in the game of chess, moving things forward, shifting the balance of play, but only until the real player ultimately does battle.

Jimmy is history. My next move will need to be handled carefully. It feels like days since I’ve slept properly, but that doesn’t matter. If anything, it adds to the half-dead, half-alive feeling I’ve carried around with me for so long. And still the anger bubbles below the surface. I know I have so much more to do. Each step is its own means to an end. It won’t be long before people start putting two and two together, connecting Jenkins and Gahan. It will bring things closer to home, but no mind. I still have time. If I don’t fuck things up.

That’s the funny thing about secrets. For some people they feel huge, as if they should be obvious to everyone. For me, they dictate my every move. Either way, once you have them, it’s impossible to know who you can trust, or how far you can trust anyone with them.

Darling Clodagh, you looked so fragile yesterday, yet resolute. In
a way it makes what I need to do somewhat easier. You’re looking for answers and that’s understandable. That’s what I want you to do. But you have no idea what you’re messing with. The answers are never enough. The answers lead to more questions and, ultimately, the truth, and the truth isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be.

Last night the sky looked bruised, just like your face, Clodagh – a mishmash of faded purple. Gahan, the stupid idiot, died too fast.

As I walk, the trees cast shadows, and again my mind drifts. I pass others, wondering why they don’t know what I’ve done. There is power within this feeling – retribution for past sins, and the feeling that what happened in Seacrest has never really left any of us.

I think about Jenkins again, his last moments on this earth, swallowing the water, gasping for air. How I pushed him in further, my arms stretched, knowing everything had changed. I was the one in control. His eyes had bulged from their sockets, his body losing its resistance as his arms flailed his defence, until even he accepted death was the only outcome.

Lynch had no luck in finding Ozzie Brennan, and Kate had finally gone to bed in the early hours of Tuesday morning. After she’d dropped Charlie to school, she felt a sense of relief at being back at Ocean House. Somehow, within the confines of her office routine and the interaction with others, she could put her failed marriage and Charlie’s vulnerability temporarily behind her. There was a time when she might have phoned her mother and talked to her about Charlie. That hadn’t been an option since her mother’s death last year, or for a very long time, the Alzheimer’s having stolen her mother’s mind long before death finished off the task.

Kate scrolled down her appointments for the day, then contacted the social worker attached to Imogen’s case confirming the family appointment for the following morning. If nothing else, after the consultation Imogen’s family would have a better understanding of her condition. The girl had enough to deal with without having to educate those around her.

Kate had asked Lynch to let her know as soon as Ozzie Brennan turned up. She received his call shortly before midday. Before leaving her office, she glanced at a framed photograph of her, Declan and Charlie on the desk. It already felt as if what they’d had together was something in the distant past.

Lynch had located Ozzie a couple of quays up from Ocean House. It was easier for Kate to get there on foot than by driving. Dublin, like all major cities, had a serious problem when it came to people living on the streets, with a couple of thousand people putting their heads down every night to sleep in a place none would ever call home. Kate had come into contact with the homeless community as part of her
work for Ocean House, and all her previous encounters had told her the same thing: most homeless people had no desire to live on the streets, and the continuing government policy was solving little. With the demise of the Celtic Tiger, and the purse strings getting tighter, any improvements would be extremely low on anyone’s agenda. Homeless people didn’t vote, so they were about as important to certain elected politicians as the city’s ever-growing waste problem.

It was still too early to tell how the murder of Jimmy Gahan reflected on the killing of Keith Jenkins, but there was a connection, Kate was sure of it. She couldn’t have left Charlie last night. Visiting crime scenes in the middle of the night was a thing of the past. She would have to depend on the images again, but they were never the same as seeing the scene at first hand. A copycat killing couldn’t be ruled out, but assuming otherwise, the location and method were forming part of the killer’s signature. On the surface, Keith Jenkins and Jimmy Gahan seemed poles apart. But they were connected. It was simply a question of finding out how. Right now, only the killer knew which way the dots were joined, but both men had been chosen for a reason. Their paths had crossed and, considering everything, she was sure O’Connor would come up with something once he’d dug into their earlier backgrounds.

She wondered if it was some kind of personal vendetta. If so, how many targets were on the killer’s list? Again she thought of the location. The second killing had taken place further up the canal, but the killer had taken another risk. Even late at night with low visibility, he could have been seen in such a public place. There was also the time gap with Jenkins. Had the killer stalled? If he had, he had been more focused with Gahan’s murder, meaning he had progressed. Differences happened for a reason.

Ozzie Brennan was the embodiment of life on the streets. Like many of the homeless, he wore multi-layered clothing, had weathered skin,
and carried his sense of isolation from regular punters as a given. He was tall and broad, his tossed grey hair, thick beard and moustache in stark contrast to his large pink face. Ozzie’s high forehead now frowned in anticipation of whatever it might be that Lynch and Kate wanted to get out of him. He sat with his legs crossed and arms folded. There were no office walls or furniture, but as far as Kate and Lynch were concerned, to Ozzie Brennan, they were meeting in the middle of his domain.

Despite his confident demeanour, Kate figured he wasn’t very different from many others on the streets. Beneath the surface there would be the same undercurrent of loss, brought about by the lack of somewhere warm, dry and safe to call their own, a proper home. Even if, by and large, most of them kept their feelings hidden.

It was Lynch who started the conversation, filling Ozzie in on how his friend Jimmy Gahan had been killed, how the police were keen to know if there was any connection between his late friend and the celebrity Keith Jenkins. As Lynch continued with the explanation of what had happened, Kate watched Ozzie’s glassy eyes and blank stare, figuring he had probably already heard most of the story.

The news of what had been done to Jimmy would have reached Ozzie long before it ever reached Lynch or Kate, but that didn’t deter the young detective from going through the motions. He wanted to put Ozzie at his ease, to let him feel the police were keeping him up to speed on things. Lynch told Ozzie about how he had heard that he and Jimmy had been real close, allowing a couple of moments to pass before asking Ozzie if he knew of any relatives they should contact. Looking down towards his toes, Ozzie started to sing, a low, breathless, mournful rendition of ‘Row, row, row your boat gently down the stream, merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream.’

Kate looked down at the man’s feet. Despite the chill of the day, all he wore were thick brown sandals, his toes as red as the tip of his nose. Even with his head slightly bowed, she could see the drippings from his nose, which Ozzie Brennan wasn’t bothering to wipe away. Unsure
if the drips were from the cold or his upset over losing his friend, Kate willed him to lift his face and look at one of them.

By the time Ozzie did look up, she got her answer. The man’s eyes might have been bloodshot from the previous night’s drinking, but there was no mistaking the tears, none of which poured down his face but rather filled his eyes, refusing to go anywhere.

His voice sounded cracked. ‘Jimmy wanted to get himself sorted. He wanted to lie on a nice comfy bed, have a bleedin’ flat-screen television and smell nice. Not a lot to ask, really, is it?’

It wasn’t a question Ozzie expected either Lynch or Kate to answer. Instead Kate looked at Lynch, then asked Ozzie if she could sit down beside him.

‘The bench is free. That’s why I’m here.’

‘Tell us about Jimmy.’

Just like Lynch, Kate allowed time before expecting the man to answer, but this time Ozzie seemed ready to talk.

‘Jimmy always had a story, an idea, a regular entrepreneur he was. He would have given Alan Sugar a run for his money. We’d be queuing up at Merchants Quay for breakfast, and he’d be going on about some bloody crap idea or venture.’

‘Do you think he knew Keith Jenkins?’ Kate tried to maintain eye contact.

‘Jimmy didn’t mention names. It’s not that he didn’t trust me, the very opposite, but names never came into it.’

‘I hear Jimmy might have found himself a nice benefactor.’ Lynch flicked to a new page in his notebook.

‘You can close your bloody book. I’m not planning on giving out autographs today.’ Ozzie stared straight ahead of him, as if talking to no one other than himself. ‘On the streets, everyone is our fucking benefactor, whether it’s an arsehole in a suit, or one of them young girls helping out with the food parcels. They’re all our bleeding benefactors. It’s shit about Jimmy, but his wasn’t the first bodybag to be taken off the streets. That famous guy, the one that got killed the
other day, he’s the only one you pair are interested in. People like me and Jimmy can go to Hell for all you lot give a fuck.’

Kate put her hand on his shoulder. ‘That’s not true, Ozzie. Detective Lynch and I want to know who did this to Jimmy. When it comes to murder, all victims are equal in the eyes of the law.’

‘Yeah, well, dead is dead. There’s nothing going to help Jimmy now.’ Ozzie unfolded his arms and legs, then refolded them in the opposite direction, the shift of body position giving more weight to his words. Kate kept her hand on his shoulder.

Lynch, who had remained standing, moved in a little closer, shadowing Ozzie, his voice sounding cold. ‘Maybe not, pal, but later on tonight, when you’re here on the streets, when your body is rattling with the cold, you might get to thinking about the benefactor who did this to Jimmy.’

Ozzie gave Lynch a look. Clearly he wasn’t surprised by the detective’s coldness, at least, not as surprised as Kate had been. ‘I’m not your bleedin’ pal. I might rattle with the cold tonight, but I’m no snitch, and I won’t be worrying about any benefactor either.’

‘No?’ Kate’s tone was softer than Lynch’s. ‘Why not, Ozzie? I know you cared about Jimmy.’

‘I did care about him. Jimmy was my pal. Me and him … Well, let’s just say we had a lot in common.’

‘Like what?’

‘Both good-looking for a start.’ Ozzie attempted a laugh but it got stuck in his chest, like a mucus-inflamed cough.

Kate remembered the cocktail Morrison had spoken about after Jenkins was pulled out of the canal, thinking of how the finality of death, no matter how you dressed it up, was the same for rich and poor alike. ‘I can see that. The good looks that is.’ Kate smiled. ‘What else did you and Jimmy have in common?’

‘Let’s just say we both got fucked over by folk, but we were different as well. Me, I had my way of surviving, and he had his. The odd days, when I’d get a shower and fresh clothes from the shelter, I’d pick up a
bit of work, nothing permanent, mind. I used to be a bricklayer, you know, fully qualified. I was never afraid of a bit of lugging around, never afraid of hard work. Well, once I’d get a few bob together, I’d usually pick myself up some cider. Then I’d come back here to my bench or party in some cosy doorway. Jimmy wasn’t content with that. He used to be posh, you see, lived the life of Reilly. He wanted more than a few bottles of cider. Jimmy wanted his old life back.’

‘And this benefactor, Ozzie, the one Jimmy never mentioned by name, was he a way of him getting that life back?’ Kate waited.

‘Maybe, Miss. As I said, Jimmy always had some scheme or other on the go. He did have family, though, a sister.’

‘A sister?’

‘Yeah. I think her name was Deborah, or Debbie.’