The Rule Book (25 page)

After ten minutes one of the bar staff carried Cahill’s meal over to him – pan-fried minute steak on ciabatta with chips, onion rings and a side salad. He ordered a second pint and tucked into the food. A man in his early thirties brushed past him heading for the toilets.

A few seconds later, the man at the end of the table stood up. He turned his novel open to keep his page and placed it next to the near-empty glass of Coke, letting the bar staff know that he’d be back. He pulled a plastic bag from his satchel, scrunching it up in his hand and forcing it into his right trouser pocket, rounded the end of the table, bounded up a couple of steps and headed through the door to the stairs leading down to the toilets. As he descended, he pulled on a pair of thin rubber gloves and placed a surgical face mask over his mouth. He could feel his rage welling up inside and fought to suppress it, seeking a calm purposefulness. At the bottom of the steps he turned right and pushed open the toilet door.

The man in his thirties was standing at the third urinal, the one furthest away from the door and next to one of the two toilet cubicles. The walls were covered in small white tiles, adverts strategically placed above each urinal. The cubicle door was made of pine, the dividing wall between the cubicles aqua, the floor black. The man didn’t turn to look at the new arrival.

The Raven headed for the cubicle next to the man, who was just starting to finish his piss. As he drew level with the man’s back he harnessed his fury, shoving both of his hands hard into the man’s head driving it into a silver framed advertisement for WKD drinks, the tiles underneath cracking with the impact. He savagely yanked the man’s head back by his hair and slammed it forward again. The man started to slump to the floor, only held upright by The Raven pressing his weight into him from behind.

He let him fall, the man’s jaw smashing off the urinal lip, bucking his head back violently. The Raven stepped quickly over the prone body and dragged its dead weight into the cubicle. He struggled to get the body sitting on the toilet and then had to contort his own figure to get the door closed. He flicked over the catch locking the door and pulled the plastic bag from his trouser pocket. From within it he removed another plastic bag and a red scarf. He threw the scarf onto the man’s face.

He froze. The door to the toilet had opened and someone had entered the room. A couple of seconds later he could hear the zip on the new arrival’s trousers being pulled down and then the sound of the man’s piss hitting and swirling round a urinal. Thirty seconds later the man zipped his trousers back up, washed his hands and then left without drying them.

The Raven let out a long breath, feeling collected and empty; his anger subsided. He pulled one of the bags over one of the unconscious man’s hands, then took an elastic band from his jacket pocket and pulled it over the bag, securing it to the limp wrist. He repeated the procedure with the other hand. Next he pulled a Stanley knife from his left trouser pocket and extended the blade. Carefully he lifted up the rubber band and bag on the man’s left arm and slashed rapidly and viciously across his wrist dropping the elastic band down as the blood started to spray. He repeated the exercise with the other wrist. The bags started to slowly fill with blood.

Next he took the scarf and wrapped it around the man’s neck. Pulling it down slightly he slashed across the man’s throat in one motion, quickly pulling the scarf up to stop the blood spraying over himself and the cubicle. He retracted the blade and placed it back in his pocket.

From the top pocket of his shirt he took two business cards which he jammed between the toilet paper holder and the dividing wall. He then withdrew the next chapter, already sealed in a clear, folded plastic bag, and slotted it past the man’s flaccid penis between his underpants and trousers.

He opened the door, placed a shoelace around the lock, and stepped out of the cubicle. He closed the door, tugged on both ends of the lace and pulled over the lock, before releasing one end and teasing it free. Next he washed the blood off the rubber gloves, but did not remove them. He unhooked the face mask, checked his appearance in the mirror and straightened his hair. He then left the toilet heading back upstairs, pulling a wet wipe from a travel pack in his jacket pocket as he ascended.

He wiped the door handle leading back into the bar, pulled it open and headed back to his Coke and novel. He retrieved his bag from the floor, hanging it on his shoulder, then downed the remainder of his drink, picked up the novel and wiped quickly the surface where he had been sat with the wet wipe. He then left the pub still carrying the empty Coke glass in his gloved hands.

As Cahill pushed the last of the onion ring into his mouth he shoved the plate away from himself and dabbed at his mouth with a napkin. He placed the remainder of his pint on top of his newspaper and stood up.

He descended the stairs and went for a piss. The toilet was quiet; one of the cubicles occupied. He finished, zipped up and washed his hands, blowing them dry. As he opened the door to leave he heard a soft splat sound behind him. Rather than investigate he exited and started to climb the stairs. As he reached the top he almost collided with a young man in a cheap looking, light grey suit, who was turning into the stairwell.

‘Sorry,’ the man said, stepping back.

‘No problem.’ Cahill passed the man and returned to his spot, taking another sup of his pint and turning to the sports pages.

The young man continued down the stairs entering the men’s toilet. He moved to the first urinal and went for a piss, staring at the advertisement. As he was turning to head to the sinks he spotted a dark red trail starting to ooze from under the slight gap at the foot of the closed cubicle door. He moved towards it, crouching down to get a better look. ‘Are you okay in there?’ he asked, standing up again. ‘Hello? Hello?’

He knocked on the door and getting no response tried to push it open, finding it locked. ‘Hello? Are you alright?’ A slight panic was starting to grow in his chest, a sense that his ribs were been crushed. He moved into the adjacent cubicle and stood on the toilet rim, leaning over to balance against the aqua partition and look down over it.

A man was sat on the toilet staring up at the ceiling, his forehead bloody but his face drained of colour, his arms hanging limply by his sides, his flaccid penis hanging out of his flies. A red scarf was wrapped around his neck, his shirt soaked in blood. A white plastic bag was tied around his right wrist covering his hand, the weight inside pulling it down. The left hand was exposed, the slash marks across the wrist clear. Beneath it a plastic bag lay on the floor, blood oozing slowly from its opening.

‘Fuckin’ hell,’ the young man said in a flat Dublin accent, recoiling instinctively. He took another quick glance to confirm what he’d seen and bolted for the toilet door, pulling his mobile phone from his trouser pocket.

McEvoy rubbed his right eye and tried to stifle a yawn.

‘He’s a stubborn bastard, I’ll say that,’ Bishop said, pushing back his chair, standing and moving to the window. ‘He must know that there’s no way out of this?’ It had just started to rain again, the sky a murky grey, people scurrying on the street below, pulling up collars and pushing up umbrellas. He turned back to face McEvoy. ‘Whatever he tries to argue, the forensic evidence places him at the four murder sites. There’s no getting out of that.’

‘He insists that that evidence’s been planted,’ McEvoy replied wearily. ‘That he’s being framed.’

‘And do you believe him?’ Bishop asked incredulously.

‘I, er …’ McEvoy hesitated.

‘Jesus, Colm,’ Bishop snapped, his face starting to flush red, ‘he’s as guilty as hell! We all know he’s guilty. The only person who doesn’t think he is guilty is him! I want him formally charged with the murders. Do you hear me? This has gone on long enough. The press, the politicians and the public – they all want to know what the hell’s going on. They want to know that we’ve caught The Raven. That it’s over.’

‘But we’re still questioning him,’ McEvoy replied without conviction. His time as a hero was feeling short-lived. Bishop’s short fuse was easily lit and he seemed to possess an inexhaustible supply of matches. ‘And we’re still collecting and collating the evidence,’ he added, knowing that Bishop wouldn’t care; he needed something to sate the never ending appetite of the media.

‘We have enough evidence to charge him, for feck’s sake! The rest will show up in time. You know it will. It’s just a case of doing the bloody legwork. Have you any idea what kind of pressure we’re under here, Colm? Have you seen the news or the newspapers? This is a global story. And I mean global. Every feckin’ news crew in the world has descended on Dublin. The Minister for Justice is on the phone to the Garda Commissioner every five feckin’ minutes wanting to know what’s happening! And he’s then onto me. I’ve been doing my best to shield you from all that shit, to give you the time and space to do your job, but it’s now time to move things along. I’m telling you, Colm, not asking you, to charge him.’

The phone rang and Bishop snatched the receiver out of its cradle. ‘Bishop!’ He listened for ten seconds or so. ‘What! Are you sure? … For God’s sake! Tell them to seal the place off. You know the routine.’ He slammed the receiver down, his cheeks so red they looked like they would start to bleed. ‘They’ve found another body. It’s in the men’s toilets of The White Horse on George’s Quay. It’s on the opposite bank to Liberty Hall, near to Tara Street Station. His neck has been slit and his wrists slashed. There were two of his feckin’ cards stuck to the wall. You’d better get down there and find out what the hell’s happened.’

‘They’ve found another body?’ McEvoy repeated, rising, disbelief in his voice, his bowels shifting, feeling as if they were about to drop out from under him.

‘What do I have to do, repeat everything?’ Bishop snapped angrily. ‘Yes, they’ve found another body; on George’s Quay.’

‘Okay, shit. Look, what should I do about Dermot Brady?’ McEvoy asked, still trying to process the news.

‘Fuck Dermot Brady!’ Bishop shouted. ‘Get to that murder site and find out what the hell’s going on! And ring me the minute you get there.’

‘I want Barney Plunkett as the DI,’ McEvoy asked, gathering himself, ‘and Hannah Fallon. I need people familiar with all of this.’

‘I don’t care! You can have BoBo the feckin’ Clown as far as I’m concerned, just get on with it!’

McEvoy headed for the door, a mix of anger and anxiety rising in his chest. His left hand instinctively plucked at the plastic substitute in his pocket.

‘I hope for your sake it’s a copycat or something,’ Bishop mumbled, turning back to the window, massaging his throbbing temples. ‘Jesus.’

He was standing on the far bank of the river watching McEvoy exit a car, glancing around before heading into the pub. He knew that the most sensible thing to do was to disappear; to get away from the murder scene, and yet he desperately felt the need to cross over the river and nose around; to find out what was happening; to introduce himself to McEvoy and get a measure of the man; to offer himself to the investigation as a witness – he’d been in the bar at the time and had fled or he’d seen the killer leave and head up the alley. He’d now shed his disguise and knew he could mingle in the crowd without fear of recognition.

Following Cahill from Harcourt Street to The White Horse had been easy. As soon as they set off he knew Cahill was heading to his usual Thursday lunchtime eating spot; a spot that he had scoped out for a killing, along with tens of others, as part of his pattern to frame Brady. He was originally going to target Cahill as a victim, but perhaps now the focus would shift to him instead – he was out at Glencree and he knew Hennessey through Brady; he had all the connections to make him a suspect.

It had certainly been the most exhilarating of the slayings. The second man entering the toilets whilst he was still in the cubicle had added a certain edge and the fact that so many people were around had heightened the adrenaline rush. Someone might have seen through his disguise and recognised him or if things had gone wrong he would have had to fight his way out from the basement and then try and escape through busy streets. He’d killed in broad daylight in the middle of the city – he’d told the world that he could kill anywhere, any time; that The Raven was formidable and
The Rule Book
infallible. There would be a media frenzy.