False Mermaid (36 page)

“Sorry, can’t stay—I just came into town for a few things, and I’ve got to be getting back.”

“Right. Well, sure—” Devaney reached for a beer mat and produced a biro to scribble down a phone number. “We’re here for the week, anyway,
hoping for a few tunes and a bit of
craic
. That’s my mobile. Give us a shout, and we’ll have a bit of music next time you’re about.”

Cormac looked down to the corner where Róisín sat waiting for her father to return, fingering the next tune on the neck of her fiddle. “You’ve taught her well.”

Devaney tried to downplay the compliment. “Ah, she’s coming along. You know as well as I do, teaching’s got very little to do with it.”

Cormac tapped the edge of the beer mat in a parting salute, then tucked it into his pocket as he headed for the door.

Karin Bledsoe sat on the edge of the table and addressed Truman Stark. “Okay, let’s go over it once more. We’ve got your prints on a car that crashed because someone jammed the brakes. And you’re telling us you don’t know anything about it?”

“That’s right.”

“Come on, Truman, just tell us what happened. We can’t work with you if you won’t work with us.”

They’d been talking to Stark for three hours. So far all he’d done was deny everything. Frank looked down at a sketch he’d made in his notebook, an oval filled with interlocking hexagons. Karin had been batting the kid around like a puma playing with a turtle. And Truman Stark did what any creature would do in that situation—he withdrew. His eyes had that watchful look of a person who’d been struck too often to trust anyone. But if he knew somebody had tampered with Nora’s brakes, why wouldn’t he tell them? Who was he trying to protect?

“We found the pictures, Truman—the ones of Tríona Hallett up in your bedroom. Did you enjoy making up little scenarios for the two of you to play out? What happened—did things not go quite the way you’d planned?”

Truman sat, hands in his pockets, staring at the tabletop. He hadn’t asked for a lawyer , and Frank couldn’t shake the notion that he wanted to give them something—but what?

Karin tried again. “What do you do with all that gear we found in your room?”

“Nothing.”

“Don’t give me that. I think you go out on patrol. Almost like a real cop. You think you’re Superman and Batman and Spiderman all rolled into one, don’t you? With your radio and your handcuffs, and your big nightstick. What happened—did you wash out of law enforcement at community college? Maybe you never made it that far.”

Stark’s breathing grew shallower, more agitated. “You don’t know anything.”

“I know it’s illegal, impersonating an officer.”

“I never told anybody I was a cop.”

“No, just went out on patrol every night in your spiffy uniform and your shiny fake badge. That wouldn’t be anything like impersonation, hell no.”

“Somebody’s got to—”

Karin set her face only inches from Stark’s. When she spoke, her voice was deadly quiet. “What? What were you going to say? ‘Somebody’s got to do it?’ Don’t make me laugh. If we have to let you go, and I find out down the road that you’ve just been jerking us around, that you really did smash those women’s faces in, you are going to need serious reconstructive surgery yourself, my friend. Do you get me?”

At that moment, Stark’s defiance seemed to mask something else—was it shock? For a split second, Frank imagined that Truman Stark had never known exactly how Tríona Hallett died—or that she wasn’t the only victim. Unless he was mistaken, Karin’s tiny slip was the exact moment Truman Stark had found out. But they were still getting nowhere. He cut in: “Detective Bledsoe, can I talk to you for a minute?”

They stepped out into the corridor, and Frank kept his voice low. “Karin, this isn’t working. He’s not going to give us anything at this rate.”

“Are you dissing my interview technique?”

“No—I just think we need to switch gears, try a different approach.”

“Be my guest. You haven’t exactly been keeping up in there so far—”

“Look, if you’re upset with me for some reason—”

“What reason could I possibly have for being upset with you, Frank? Let’s see—ignoring my phone calls? No, couldn’t be that. Going off on your own, checking leads on cases we’re supposed to be working together—that’s not really it. Oh yeah—maybe it’s the fact that your brother died, and I had to find out you even
had
a brother from Don Padgett in patrol. We’re supposed to be
partners,
Frank. Does that mean anything to you? You’ve cut me off. You’ve been dancing around, trying like hell to avoid me ever since you got that fucking phone call from Dublin. You know it’s true.”

It was true. But he suddenly felt so weary of it all—of Karin, Nora, everything. “Look, do we have to talk about this right now? We’re in the middle of something here—”

“No—
you’re
in the middle of something, Frank. And I’m out in left field. I’m fucking miles away.” She studied him for a few seconds. “Okay—you deal with Stark. Be my guest. I’m going upstairs to start filling out paperwork for a transfer.”

“Karin—” He could hear the note of resignation in his own voice, which meant she could hear it too.

“Cheer up, Frank. I know it’s a relief for you. And let’s face it: I’ve never exactly been the sentimental type. We’ve both seen this coming for a while.” She turned on her heel and walked away.

Frank waited a few seconds before going back in. He sat across the table from Truman Stark, and opened a file he’d been carrying with him. He read a flash of panic in the kid’s eyes, but went about his business calmly, methodically.

He set a photo of Nora on the table in front of Stark. “We know this woman was in your parking garage the other day. Looking at the place they found her sister’s body.” A quick glance up said Truman Stark hadn’t been in possession of that fact. “Yeah, sisters. Bet you wondered why she was so interested in that space. What did you think—that she was a reporter, maybe a private eye?” No eye contact. “You chased those kids away in Frogtown, kept her from getting roughed up. So I’m wondering, why you would do that if you were just going to try to harm her later? Doesn’t make much sense.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“I’m not saying you did. But you saw something, didn’t you?”

Frank had imagined a gloved hand, Peter Hallett’s hand, slipping that water bottle under the brake pedal, hoping to be rid of Nora Gavin once and for all. He was so close to nailing that bastard right now, he could taste it. And at this moment, Truman Stark was all that stood in his way. Hard not to pressure the kid, but he knew that would be exactly the wrong move.

Instead he slid a glossy headshot of Tríona Hallett across the table. Stark tried not to look, but in the end, he couldn’t resist.

Frank said: “Beautiful, isn’t she? I could understand somebody just wanting to watch her. To admire her.” No reaction. Frank continued: “Used to see her around Lowertown, didn’t you? Don’t worry, I’m not trying to pin anything on you. I just need information.”

After a long pause, Stark mumbled: “She used to park at the garage. I’d see her on the cameras. Not every day, but pretty often.”

Frank studied the young man’s miserable expression. “Did you ever speak to her—at the garage or anywhere else?”

Stark shook his head wordlessly.

“But you copied her picture off the video at work. You followed her.”

“It wasn’t like that—”

“What was it like? Tell me.” Frank waited. Silence—the interrogator’s best friend. He watched the kid’s eyes dart back and forth, his lips twisting with indecision. “We talked to everyone who worked in the parking garage. But you’re the only one who definitely saw Tríona Hallett in the neighborhood, and lied about it. You told us at the time of the murder that you’d never seen her before, and it turns out you’ve got pictures of her plastered all over your bedroom. You do see my problem, don’t you?”

Stark said nothing.

“What happened, Truman? Did you follow her, try to talk to her? Maybe you didn’t mean to hurt her. Accidents happen—we get that. The thing is, you lied to us—and I have to tell you, that part doesn’t look good at all.”

“I never touched her, I swear. You said you weren’t trying to pin anything on me—” His voice was becoming a reedy whine.

“And you said you were at home on the night she was killed. Your mother backed you up, but you weren’t home that night, were you, Truman? You were out on patrol, just like you were on Thursday night, like you are every night. I’ve been inside your house. I know why you can’t stay there.”

“If I told the truth you wouldn’t believe me. You’ve got it all backwards—”

Frank heard something new in the kid’s voice. “What have we got backwards?”

“You just don’t get it. I would never hurt her—I was trying to protect her.”

“And why did she need protecting?”

“She was always looking over her shoulder, like somebody was after her.”

“Did you ever see anyone following her?”

“Once. Maybe.”

“Was it this man?” He fished a picture of Peter Hallett out of his folder, and slid it in front of Stark.

“No, not him.”

Frank felt hope sputter and fizzle out. Truman Stark looked him directly in the eye for the first time. “Wasn’t a guy at all—it was a woman. Blonde. Kinda stuck-up looking. I saw her again at the river on Thursday night. With her—” He pointed to the picture of Nora. “They were arguing about something.”

The road that passed in front of the house at Ardcrinn was empty for miles, but Nora still couldn’t help looking back over her shoulder as she and Elizabeth made their way over the headland to the fishing village of Port na Rón. She had slipped one of Cormac’s walkie-talkies into her jacket pocket before leaving the house—just in case. He must have taken the other one into town. She glanced over at Elizabeth, trudging across the treeless upland, staring at what must seem like nothing but windswept desolation. The blanket bogs here in Donegal were completely different from the high bogs of the midlands. Here the peat was only four or five sods deep—a thin brown mantle stretched over unforgiving stone. This place, like all bogland, only appeared barren and empty; it was actually teeming with life: foxes and pheasants, hares and birds and insects and strange plants, a huge variety of miniature and microscopic worlds.

They found the ruined village as deserted as the road. But the view from the headland was spectacular. A beach of round stones stretched in a crescent shape from the foot of the cliff around the mouth of the bay. The waves were wild today, rumbling like thunder on the way in, hissing and tumbling the pebbles as they withdrew. A silent white waterfall cut into the green cliff around the side of the small bay. A dozen mottled black-and-white sheep grazed in the pasture above the rocky strand, their shaggy flanks splotched with bright azure dye. From the height, Nora could also see several craggy islands, and the dark shapes of seabirds clinging to their precarious nesting places. The caves Cormac had mentioned must be over below the falls somewhere. The wind was relentless as ever, but the salt air it carried was warm and damp under heavy clouds. Nora plucked at her jersey front. They’d not even begun the climb down the beach, and she was already starting to sweat.

She had told no one of the tiny, unsettling detail she had observed yesterday on the cross-country journey. Elizabeth had left everything behind in her luggage at Dublin Airport, so they stopped at Dunnes Stores on the outskirts of Sligo to pick up toiletries and a few items of clothing. Passing
by the curtained fitting room, Nora had caught a fleeting sideways glimpse of Elizabeth in her white cotton briefs—and something else as well. A piece of sheeting, or something like it, wrapped tight around her child’s slender torso, fixed in place with a safety pin. The image actually took a moment to register. Nora’s immediate thought was of the old ballads about girls who bound their chests and dressed in sailors’ clothes to go off to sea. What was Elizabeth’s reason for disguising her developing shape? All sorts of disturbing possibilities loomed, and now Nora teetered once more upon the point where she had remained suspended for nearly two days now: broach the subject, or keep silent and wait?

In the end, there was no guarantee that waiting would bring about a result. She said: “Lizzabet, I want you to know that I’m ready, whenever you want to talk.” No response. Nora felt as though she was treading on dangerous ground. She pushed on: “I remember being your age, not wanting to grow up, and wishing everything could just stay the same—”

Elizabeth stared at the ground below her feet, newly exposed ears glowing with mortification, and Nora knew she’d gone too far. “Never mind. We don’t have to talk about it right now.”

Nora’s probing words had left Elizabeth slightly unsettled, but standing here above the rocky beach, she turned toward the sea and felt her spirits lift. This place was the closest thing yet to her own Useless Bay. Following Nora down the embankment to the beach, she felt her attention drawn to tufts of wet grass that grew between the rocks, fascinated to find perfect spiderwebs sagging with tiny beads of dew, the curling fiddleheads of ferns, black-and-white-striped snails leaving shiny trails on the undersides of every prickly thistle leaf. As they reached the stony beach, she stopped to lift the drooping head of a delicate purple flower.

“A harebell,” Nora said from beside her. “I didn’t know you were interested in plants.”

Elizabeth shrugged. “I don’t know the names—I just like looking at them.” She bent to pick up a smooth oval stone, examining its tumbled, whitened surface. “I like collecting things.”

“What sorts of things?”

“Rocks and shells, mostly—I had to leave them in Seattle. My dad said there was no point in carting worthless crap halfway across the country.” She set the first stone back, and picked up another. “I kept the sea glass, though. It’s kind of hard to find.”

Nora turned away abruptly, and Elizabeth stood for a moment, wondering if she’d said something wrong. “Is it all right if I look around?”

Nora nodded without turning back. Elizabeth stepped away gingerly, following the line left by the high tide, eyes zeroing in on the ridgy cups of limpet shells, the blue glint of mussels with their bright pearly insides. She stooped to pick up a small scallop shell and glanced back at Nora—who was still standing, arms crossed, like she was stuck in that spot.