‘I guessed that. We all know how Jim died, don’t we? But I’ve accounted for all my dealings with Dominic. I haven’t anything else to tell you.’
Murphy didn’t comment on that. ‘Certain things were found at the scene of the crime. You are probably aware from your own experience that everything in the immediate vicinity of a suspicious death is examined very carefully. Anything which might have significance is taken to our forensic laboratories for detailed investigation.’
‘Of course I am aware of that. But you will have found nothing which will connect me with the death of Dominic. I’ve admitted that we had an association, but it was long over at the time of his death.’
‘You’ve also admitted to bitter resentment at the manner in which Dominic O’Connor ended your affair.’
Sarah glanced at Lucy. ‘I was as resentful as any woman would be who’s been ditched cruelly and unceremoniously in favour of a younger model. I then got over it and carried on with the rest of my life. I propose to continue doing that now.’
Murphy nodded and produced a polythene container which he held out a little awkwardly at arm’s length for inspection by the woman in the simple dark green dress. ‘Do you recognise this?’
Lisa lifted her hands automatically towards the object, then dropped them back heavily to her sides. It was a sapphire, set skilfully in gold. The very delicate gold chain which had carried it was broken, glittering like an accusation within the drab polythene.
There was panic suddenly on the face which had been so resolutely calm. ‘That pendant’s mine. Unless you’ve dug up one exactly the same to frame me.’
That suggestion sounded ridiculous even in her own ears and she wished she hadn’t made it. Now at last DS Peach spoke to her. ‘It’s yours, Mrs O’Connor. It was found in the room where Dominic O’Connor died, by the scene of crime team investigating his death. Can you account for its presence there?’
‘No. Perhaps it had been there for a long time.’
‘Does that really seem likely to you?’
‘No. I knew I’d lost it. Perhaps Dominic kept it.’
‘That doesn’t seem likely either, according to everything we’ve learned about him. The likeliest explanation is that you lost it last Friday night, when you were twisting a cable tight round that victim’s neck.’
‘I didn’t do that. I was nowhere in the vicinity of that house on Friday night.’ Sarah looked from one to the other of her questioners, searching for some sign that they believed her.
She found nothing to comfort her in their impassive faces.
The big hospital in Manchester was busy; on a Saturday afternoon, many families visited patients, so that there were many rather subdued children in the corridors.
Peach met the tall, grey-haired man from the security services in the reception area as he had been directed. He had expected Jefferson to be a younger and fitter man, but it seemed the terrorist incident was serious enough to involve top brass rather than field operators. His rank was a help when they came to the room where Patrick Riordan had been isolated. Jefferson told the sister who came out to meet them that access to her patient had already been authorised, that state security and perhaps other lives in the future might be involved. The rather grim-faced medic didn’t go through the ritual of protest and the stuff about responsibility to patients which Percy usually met when he sought access to a villain.
The sister nodded acceptance and said merely, ‘Mr Riordan is very ill. I must ask you to conclude your business in no more than ten minutes.’
Peach grinned at the fresh-faced constable who sat on a chair outside the door. As a young copper, he had himself endured hours of boredom as sentinel to villains in hospital, all of them less interesting and lower profile than Patrick Riordan. Once inside the quiet room, they worked their way carefully to the bedside through the machine feeding the drip in the arm, the oxygen canister and the heart monitor. The figure beneath them might have been a corpse, for all the movement it evinced.
The older man, who had seemed so much in control, was suddenly diffident here. The nearness of death in the slight figure beneath the blankets brought its own uncertainties, perhaps even a reluctant respect. Jefferson spoke softly, addressing the shape twice as ‘Mr Riordan’. Receiving no reaction, he then glanced hopefully at DCI Peach.
Percy set his fingers upon the forearm which was, apart from the thin face, the only unbandaged flesh above the blankets. ‘You listening, Riordan?’
For a moment, it seemed that he had not been heard. Then the shape stirred fractionally. The eyelids flickered open in slow motion, as if a great effort was being forced into this tiny, instinctive movement. The head turned a fraction, the brown eyes gazed for what seemed a long time into the face of the man whose hand was still upon the sinewy forearm. The bloodless lips moved, framed words, said unexpectedly, ‘You’re Peach.’
‘I am. And you’re in trouble.’
The faintest of smiles moved the narrow mouth for a moment. They could scarcely catch his words as he said, ‘I shot the bastard. I shot that traitor, Seamus Fitzpatrick.’
Peach glanced at his companion and received a nod of assent from the older man. ‘You didn’t kill him, Pat. He’s going to recover. You might have made Jim Fitzpatrick into a hero.’
A frown furrowed the forehead for a few seconds, then cleared, as if even the energy involved in that was too much for the stricken figure beneath the sheets. The eyes which had shut opened again, looked for a moment at the ceiling, then swivelled painfully towards Peach’s face. ‘I’m dying.’
Peach’s fingers pressed a fraction harder on the cold skin of the forearm. ‘I think you probably are, Pat, yes.’
‘I did that other traitor, you know. I got Dominic O’Connor. He didn’t live.’
‘You’re confessing to murder. Be careful here, Riordan.’
‘I don’t need to be careful. I’m a soldier, an avenging soldier. I carried out my orders. Those who matter will remember me.’
For a brief moment, the vision of glory which had driven his life energised the mortally wounded man and his voice rose above the whisper they had strained to hear. But the effort exhausted his dying brain and he drifted again into unconsciousness.
Peach spoke to him twice more, shifted his fingers on the wrist to feel the pulse which still moved faintly there, then nodded to the blue-clad figure who had appeared in the doorway of the quiet room. ‘We’ve finished here, Sister.’
NINETEEN
Lucy Peach said to her husband, ‘I didn’t much like Sarah O’Connor. But for what it’s worth, I didn’t feel she was a murderer.’
Percy nodded. ‘We got a confession this afternoon. Patrick Riordan said in Manchester Royal Infirmary that he killed Dominic O’Connor, because he was a traitor to the republican cause.’
‘That lets her off the hook then.’
‘And Brian Jacobs and Jean Parker. And Ros O’Connor and John Alderson. Unless the confession was the last fling of a dying fanatic.’
As if to reinforce that idea, the phone rang two minutes later. Patrick Riordan had died twenty minutes earlier, at eight twenty on that Saturday night. Neither Lucy nor Percy spoke for a little while; they were silenced by the finality of death, despite their familiarity with it. Then Lucy said, ‘You’ll get your weekends back — be able to play golf again. You’ve had a busy time with these two murders. I expect Tommy Tucker will want to call a news conference to brag about his efficiency.’
Percy, who was gazing towards the glory of the clear western sky as the long May day died slowly, gave only an abstracted smile, even at the mention of Tucker. He watched purple infringing on crimson for another minute before he said quietly, ‘I don’t believe Patrick Riordan killed Dominic O’Connor.’