The Secret Place (Dublin Murder Squad, #5)(58)

Unless our girl was thick, the book wasn’t in her room. But a soft tip like this one – could be nothing, could be everything – it’s a rock and a hard place. Call in a full team, swarm the school grounds with searchers, come out with nothing or with some kid’s messing: you’re the squad joke and the gaffer’s budget-waster headache, can’t be trusted to make the judgement calls. Stick to whatever you and one tagalong can get done, miss the clue stuffed behind a classroom rad, miss the witness who could steer you home: you’re the fool who had it handed to you on a plate and threw it away, who didn’t think a dead boy was important, can’t be trusted to make the judgement calls.

Conway was playing it tight, playing it careful. Not that she’d care, but I agreed with that. If our girl was smart, and the odds said she was, we wouldn’t find the book either way. Stuffed in a bush a mile away by now, into a city-centre bin. If she was extra smart she’d made the card weeks ago, ditched the book then, waited till it was well gone before she set things moving.

We set out the food on the wall between us. Conway ripped the clingfilm open and went for her sandwich. Ate like it was fast fuel, no taste. Mine was better than I’d been expecting. Nice mayo and all.

‘You’re good,’ she said, through a mouthful. Not like it was a compliment. ‘Give them what they want. Tailor it special for each one. Cute.’

I said, ‘Thought that was my job. Get them comfy.’

‘They were that, all right. Next time maybe you can give them a pedicure and a foot massage, how’s that?’

I reminded myself: Just a few days, make your mark with the gaffer, wave bye-bye. Said, ‘I thought you were gonna come in, maybe. Push them a little.’

Conway flashed me a stare that said, You questioning me? I thought that was my answer, but after a moment she said, out to the playing field, ‘I interviewed the shite out of them. Last time.’

‘Those eight?’

‘All the kids. Those eight. All their year. All Chris’s year. All of them who could’ve known anything. A week in, the tabloids were getting their kacks in a knot, “Cops are going easy on the little rich kids, there’s strings being pulled, that’s why there’s been no arrest” – a couple of them said right out, practically, there was a cover-up. But there was nothing like that. I went at these kids same as I’d have gone at a bunch of knackers out of the flats. Exactly the same.’

‘I believe you.’

Her head came round fast, chin out. Looking for snide. I stayed steady.

‘Costello,’ she said, once she relaxed again, ‘Costello was only horrified. The face on him; like I was mooning the nuns. Almost every interview, he’d stop the questioning and pull me outside to give me shite about what did I think I was doing, did I want to kill my career before I even got started.’

I kept my mouth full. No comment.

‘O’Kelly, our gaffer, he was as bad. Called me into his office twice, for a bollocking: who did I think these kids were, did I think I was dealing with the same scum I grew up with, why wasn’t I spending my time looking into homeless guys and mental patients, did I know how many phone calls the commissioner was getting from pissed-off daddies, he was gonna buy me a dictionary so I could look up “tact” . . .’

I do tact. I said, mild, ‘They’re a different generation. They’re old-school.’

‘Fuck that. They’re Murder. They’re trying to get a killer. That’s the only thing that matters. Or that’s what I thought back then.’

Bitter sediment, running along the bottom of her voice.

‘By that time I’d no hassle telling Costello to shove it. O’Kelly, even. The whole case was going to f*ck, with my name on it. I’d’ve done anything. But by that time it was too late. Wherever my shot was, in there, I’d missed it.’

I made some kind of noise, Been there. Concentrated on my sandwich.

Some cases are like that: dirty bastards. We all get them. But get one straight out of the gate, and that’s what people see when they look at you: bad luck walking.

Anyone got too close to Typhoid Conway, he’d get that taint all over him. People would stay away from him, too; the Murder lads would.

Just a few days.

‘So,’ Conway said. Swigged her coffee, balanced it on the wall. ‘Boils down to I’ve got a file full of complaints from rich guys, I don’t have Costello to back me up any more, and best of all, a year on I still don’t have a solve. O’Kelly gets this much of an excuse’ – finger and thumb, a hair apart – ‘he’s gonna kick my arse off this case, give it to O’Gorman or one of that shower of tossers. The only reason he hasn’t done it already is he hates reassigning: says the media or the defence can spin that as the initial investigation f*cked up. But they’re on at him, O’Gorman and McCann, dropping the little hints about a fresh pair of eyes.’

That was why Houlihan. Not to protect the kids. To protect Conway.

‘This time I’m playing the long game. Those interviews weren’t a waste: we’ve narrowed it down. Joanne, Alison, Selena, Julia as an outside chance. It’s a start. Yeah, maybe we’d’ve got farther if I’d started pushing them. I can’t afford to chance it.’

One more snap at Joanne, and there it would’ve been: Daddy’s phone call, O’Kelly’s excuse, both of our arse-kick out of the door.