“Come on John, now you ask me ‘can I borrow your computer to look at the SIM card. Sure you can. But I don’t think there’s some mystery, because your painting’s still in the gallery. You’re reading a lot into a series of coincidences.”
“I don’t really think so.”
“Mmmh.”
They ordered, and as McBride expected, the food was not brilliant. But they lingered, however, over desserts and drinks, spinning out the evening, learning about each other.
Eventually Antonio himself, who was anxious that the meal had been good, brought the bill. McBride didn’t disabuse him. Antonio must have known why the restaurant wasn’t doing well.
As they waited for change, McBride heard the sound of fire engines, fast footsteps, and past the window of the restaurant, people running, all in one direction. He could see that the evening air was thick with smoke, could smell it seeping into the restaurant. There was a glow in the distance that hadn’t been there moments before. As he watched he saw the glow become a large fire lighting the night sky.
“The Gallery!” gasped Helen, on the way to the restaurant door, pushing it open with both hands. They jostled through the gathering crowd, edging closer and closer to the gallery. A mass of flames, sparks lifting in the breeze as roof beams crashed to the ground. A stench of wood smoke drifted in the wind towards them.
Two engines and a tender blocked the street close to the burning building. Hoses from ladders were gushing water ineffectively into the heart of the inferno.
A voice called, “John!”
McBride turned and saw Ian Smith, his face pale, moving heedlessly through the crowd, ignoring angry voices of the people he pushed aside.
“What a bugger, looks like it’s all gone.” He spotted a fireman temporarily unoccupied, and shouted, “Who’s in charge? I own that building.”
At first they thought the fireman had ignored Ian, but a few minutes later another fireman came over. “I’m the Crew Manager. There will be nothing left, you know. Definitely used an accelerant, whoever did it.”
Ian raised his eyebrows. “It was arson, you mean?”
“Well, we’ll need to check later, when the fire is out, but the speed this went up is very suspicious.”
There was a cacophony of police car sirens behind them, and three, then four cars screeched to a halt behind the watching crowd. Within seconds uniformed police were herding people back. A police van arrived, unloaded temporary barriers to put across the street.
“Ian, there’s no point staying here. Do you want to come back to the hotel for a nightcap?”
Ian, the heavy drinker, took no coaxing. The three of them walked back up the street. McBride went to the bar, came back with a whisky for Smith wine for Helen and a beer for himself. He put the tray on the table.
Helen said, “I’ll just fetch my laptop down” and left the bar.
McBride sat down beside Smith. “I hope you were insured.”
“What? Oh yes, to the hilt.”
“Then that’s eighty-four paintings I’ve sold today. Though I wish it was in happier ways.”
“Eighty paintings, John,” Ian smiled. “But I will want you to do me another four paintings.”
McBride and Smith were on a table close to the lobby entrance. McBride watched Helen walk across the lobby towards them. The only other people in the bar were a group of men dressed in jeans and loose shirts, drinking and telling jokes at the opposite end of the room beside the bar counter.
She hefted the computer on to the table, undid the case and powered up. Held out her hand to McBride, and he reached in his pocket for the SIM card.
“What are you doing?” said Smith.
“You’ll see. And that was the third coincidence, Helen. The fire, I mean.”
She was busy with the computer, but nodded in reply. The screen scrolled forty images. “Which one are we looking for?”
McBride moved closer.
“If I can just take over from you, I should be able to recognise the scene.”
He moved the arrow, and clicked over one of the later images. The scene filled the screen. “That’s the one. Of course the painting might not have depicted the scene at this exact time, so there could have been something else, but now we’ll never know.”
The photograph showed the village from a high view taken from a field on the hill. On the right was a large house dating back to the late eighteenth century. The back of the house was facing the camera, the rear courtyard plainly visible. There were mature trees close to the house, but leaving large gaps through which the house and courtyard were visible. To the left of the house, the village spread away in a vista, showing rising land in the distance, and blue hills beyond. McBride had picked a stunning view. That’s what artists did.
“There are vehicles and people in the courtyard. Is that what all this is about? Did you put them in the picture, John?”
“As far as I recall. Vehicles are part of the scene, just as horses and carts were in Constable’s day.”
McBride studied the photograph for a few moments, told Smith what had happened that afternoon and how it might have resulted in the fire at the gallery.
Smith said, “If the bald man did it, you’ll be able to recognise him again. This is incredible”
“So will the police when they’ve seen the CCTV shots at the hotel here.”
“But you’d tell them of the link, otherwise they might not make the connection.” McBride smiled: “They might not accept a connection if I point it out to them. They will think it’s a fanciful deduction. And it may be. But yes, I will make the police aware of it.
I might do a bit of snooping around myself before I go home. Tell me about this house, Ian,” he tapped the computer screen, “do you know the people who live there?”
“Not really, but I know about them. The house was empty for a long time. Looked at buying it myself, but it needed too much spending on it. But this couple bought it about four years ago. Haven’t done a lot of renovations. Occasionally see them in the village, but they very rarely venture out. Recluses, really. Think he has something to do with antiques. A kind way to describe the tat he collects.”
McBride zoomed into the picture to enlarge the area behind the big house. He enlarged it until they could see the individual pixels, and then pulled the picture back again, to the best magnification. At the back of the house was a box van, probably a 3.1/2 ton model Mercedes, or something similar. It looked new, white, with a small stylish logo on the side, but it was too far away to make out. From the position of the van, McBride guessed it had been reversed out of a long pan-tiled roofed outbuilding. In fact there was a pair of open doors in the outbuildings through which he could see the interior. Three men were looking at the van, standing at the rear of the vehicle and obviously conversing.
Smith peered closely at the image.
“That’s the householder,” he pointed at a grey-haired man with a straggly long ponytail, “and I’m sure I’ve seen that man before, he’s familiar. Can’t put a name to him, but it will come to me.” He glanced at his watch. “I’d better be getting along, busy day tomorrow, sorting the building out, insurance people to speak to, that sort of thing.” He stood up held out his hand to Helen.
“It has been nice to meet you. John, I’ll speak to you tomorrow, the assessor is sure to want to meet with you.”
The next morning McBride was having breakfast in the restaurant before eight o’clock, but Helen was down before him, drinking a coffee when he joined her.
“Just going, John. The shop opening is this morning, ten o’clock. I’ll be back about six, or half past. Have a good day snooping.” She blew him a kiss and dashed out of the restaurant.
McBride ate bacons and egg and was on his way into the village by nine. The blackened skeleton of the gallery was still gently smoking. A fire engine stood by. The road was closed to vehicles, but a footpath was open on the opposite side to the gallery. He made his way into the small police station, which
was just opening for business. A young constable was behind a glass screened counter.
“I wonder if I can speak to someone about the fire last night? I have some information.”
The constable selected a form. “If I can just take down your name and address, sir, the LPU inspector should be here in a minute.”
When he’d given his name and address, McBride sat on a bench, looking across at the notice board on the opposite wall, wondering who made up the crass slogans.
Ten minutes later a thin man in his early fifties, dressed in blazer and flannel trousers came in. He went across to the counter, spoke briefly to the desk cop, and went on through a door at the rear.
The constable leaned over the counter, said to McBride: “Sir, if you would go through that door to see Inspector Nolan, please.”
On the door, a neat plate bore the inspector’s name. By the time McBride went into the office, Nolan was seated behind the plain metal desk, scribbling notes on forms and putting them into a tray. This feverish activity amused McBride, who knew the man had only just sat down at his desk. Nolan looked up, frowned slightly at the interruption. He looked back at the desk, and picked up the form that had been completed at the counter; looked down at it, and then back to McBride, didn’t ask him to sit. “Right, sir, you want to tell me something about the fire. The one at the gallery, was it?”
“Correct. I know who set fire to it.”
“Really?” His eyebrows crept up his forehead in a facetious way.
“You have a crime logged for yesterday at the Manor Hotel: breaking into my room and the theft of a camera and computer. The man’s on the CCTV footage, good clear image of the face. That is the man who was the arsonist.”
“And how do you know that?”
McBride explained the man’s actions to avoid the painting being seen at the gallery.
“Slim evidence. But we follow up all leads, and we hear what you say. If you go to the counter outside and ask if you can give a statement, the young constable will witness it and make sure it goes in the fire evidence file.”
He was quickly ushered back to the reception desk, where he dictated a statement. The police constable carefully wrote down the words very slowly. McBride half expected him to lick the end of his pencil, but eventually he was done, and McBride was outside in the sunshine.
He wanted to look at the scene he had painted which had caused such a sequence of events. He turned off the main street, followed the lane gently up the hill. There was a stile and a signpost for a public footpath. Beyond the stile, it was a few hundred yards before he breasted the hill. As he looked at the scene afresh, he remembered having to move to his right for about fifty feet to get the best composition. The field was rough grass and weeds, probably used recently to keep horses in. He looked down the hill, The view re-awoke his artistic wonder, it was close to being a perfect composition, it needed little tweaking by an artist. It just called out to be painted in his fresh bold style. He concentrated his gaze on the old house to the right. Now there was no vehicle, and no people in the courtyard.
Even as he watched, the door in the garden wall burst open and an old woman dressed in a nightgown and robe ran out into the field. She tripped on a grass tuft, but quickly righted herself and toiled up the hill, waving her arms, her night dress flapping round her legs.
Now, behind her, appeared a man chasing after her. It was the shaven headed man McBride had last seen on the CCTV screen. Although the woman in the nightdress appeared to be using a lot of energy, her progress over the field was hampered by the rough going.
He watched with horror as the man caught up with her, pulled her to the ground. McBride started forward, though he knew he was too far away to intervene. The man bent over the woman drawing something out of his pocket. As he leaned over further, the woman suddenly went limp. Had he injected her with some drug? It looked like it. He picked her up in his arms, the old woman not a heavy burden. The bald man was quickly back through the door in the wall with his bundle of frail flesh.
CHAPTER FOUR
Eamonn Murphy was a grey haired sixty-year-old, with a sallow face, sunken cheeks and shaggy eyebrows. His hair hung over his ears and over the collar of his shirt at the back, in a long pony tail. He sat at a dining table, using it as a desk. Standing at the other side of the table, facing him stood the shaven-headed man Inspector James Nolan sat on Murphy’s right, wondering if he would collect his pension, due in three months’ time and worked for over his long career. So much could go wrong, and already had.
At the shaven headed man’s side of the table sat a plump man with a shock of wiry black hair.
“Jesus, Ryan,” said Murphy, “you’re a thick bastard. You fuck up getting yourself on the camera at the hotel, burn the fucking art gallery down. We tell you not under any fucking circumstances are you to leave the house, and you go prancing round the fucking fields.”
“I was catching your wife…”
“After you let her get out of the house, because you forgot her sedation, that’s fucking what. Go on get out of here.” Murphy motioned to the plump man, O’Connor, to accompany him.
As O’Connor rose, Nolan saw Murphy made a gun shape with his fingers. O’Connor nodded, and as Ryan reached the door, O’Connor pulled a pistol out of his pocket, lifted it to the back of Ryan’s head, and without pausing pulled the trigger. Nolan heard the shot reverberated round the room. Ryan crumpled gracefully to the floor. There was no blood visible, it was as though the man had fainted. Nolan thought inconsequentially that the bullet had ricoched round inside the skull without the energy to emerge.
Inspector Nolan said, “Jesus!” and shut his eyes.
Murphy said to O’Connor, “Stick him in the stable block, and we’ll bury him tonight. Nolan here will give you a hand. Make sure nobody sees you go to the stables. Put him in a sack or something.”
CHAPTER FIVE
John McBride walked back to the hotel. There was no sign of further activity at the old house, once the old lady was whisked back through the garden door. He desperately needed a computer, so he decided to drive to the shopping centre.
It was still only ten o’clock when he got there, and shoppers had still to arrive in numbers. He parked the car right by PC World. He bought a laptop with Windows 7 professional installed, since it is better than Windows 8, declined extra programmes which might have increased the salesman’s commission, but asked the guy for a cheap digital camera. The salesman started out with £500 models.
“No good. For me it’s not worth paying any more than £70. If I drop the thing, I chuck it away. You know that repair costs start at £70.”
The salesman shrugged and a deal was quickly done. He went to a café across the road and tried the computer while he drank a coffee. It was quick and he used the free wifi provided by the caterer. He found a site that gave the names of householders by just typing in the address. He entered his credit card number – £10 for six addresses, minimum charge.
The site gave the residents of the old house as Eamonn Murphy and Margaret Murphy. He assumed the latter was the escaping woman. If baldhead was living there, it wasn’t public knowledge.
McBride shut the laptop down. He drank the rest of his coffee. Murphy was an Irish name. Irish names remind some people of the Troubles. He had searched a few blogs, but couldn’t come up with the name in connection with the provos. Maybe his friend Miller might know something – he’d been in the Army a lot longer. He had a mobile number for him, in the car.
It was a long shot, because Miller worked a lot abroad, mostly in Africa, as a mercenary. Couldn’t settle down he said, to a boring civvie life.
Still it was worth trying his number, and as soon as he got back to his hotel, McBride was punching the number into his own mobile. It was picked up almost immediately.
“Miller” a voice said. There was childish shouting in the background.
“I guess you’re not in the jungle. It’s John McBride here.”
“It w
as a lot quieter in the Congo, than here with my sister’s kids. How’re you doin’? Still wielding the paintbrush and making a fortune sitting on your bum?”
“Artists do it standing up, didn’t you know? I’m in Cheshire at the moment, been painting my agent’s house. Before you say anything – painting pictures of his house. Staying five star at his expense. What I wanted to ask you is does the name Eamonn Murphy mean anything? He lives down the road in a big house, and has a connection with a guy who robbed me yesterday, and burned down the art gallery, probably”
Silence on the other end of the phone. McBride knew the connection was not broken. Sound of breathing, then: “Jesus, has that old bastard surfaced again? He’s a guy who’ll be what, say sixty-years-old, a bit gaunt, long straggly hair?”
“Not met him yet. Saw a picture that someone said was him. Taken from a long way off, but that’s how I would have described him from the photo.”
“He’ll be connected with something crooked. He was working the protection racket in Belfast for some breakaway IRA faction. Kept a lot of the cash himself, I bet. Was pretty feared, about fifteen years ago, when it was going on. More businesses were blown up for non-payment than you could wave a stick at. The owner of a bar says I can’t pay you any more – the next night Murphy comes in with a parcel tucked under his arm, sticks it on the bar top, and shouts, ‘It’s timed for two minutes’, and leads the exodus. Two minutes later, the bar is flattened. I’d like to have a go at that guy.”
“Was thinking of having a snoop round his premises tonight, see what I can learn”
“You wouldn’t want to tackle that guy by yourself if you get caught. I could do with some excitement, I’ve been home six months, resting. I’m in Manchester at the moment at my sister’s house. The kids never stop wanting me to play jungle games with them. And anyway, I’m totally fit now.”
“Now?” said McBride
“I came back from the Congo in an ambulance plane, actually. But everything’s healed up nicely, and I’m asking around for another go. Think I’ll be back in Africa ’bout two weeks’ time. Shall I drive over to see you tonight, about six, then?”