“Yeah. Here, shine it on the window.” I shift the beam and he fools around with the sash. It doesn’t budge. “Shine it here,” he says. I do and he finds a good-sized rock, which he hands to me. Then he takes off his coat, wraps it around his arm, takes the rock back, and punches it through the window, then punches around the edges to break all the glass.
“Roly!”
“We were driving by and we noticed that someone had broken a window in this house,” he says. “As law enforcement officers, we felt it necessary to investigate.”
“Great. Now I suppose you want me to climb in there?”
He finishes clearing the shards of glass away and then he says, “I’m too big to fit through there.”
“All right.” I lay his jacket out on the sill and climb through into the silent dark house.
The sound of my feet on the wood floor surprises me and I take a deep breath to try to calm my heart. It smells of old paper and cloth, dust, mildew, earth. I turn the lock and open the door to let Roly in, then lock it again behind us.
“I don’t like it,” I say. “It’s fucking creepy in here.” I turn on the flashlight on my phone and shine it around. We check each room to make sure there’s no one there.
“It looks like it was once some kind of hunting lodge,” I say. “Look.” There’s a gun cabinet on one wall in the sitting room and someone’s hung a mounted deer head above the fireplace. But everything’s old and dusty. I’m holding my phone up when the flashlight dims. “Shit, my phone is dying. Roly, shine the light up here.” There’s a calendar hanging on the wall, a picture of a tractor above “June 1993” and the name of a farm supply store in Arklow.
“Well, someone was here in 1993, anyway,” he says. “Let’s see if there’s any more evidence.”
We check the bedrooms more carefully, but they’ve been emptied of anything personal. One has a stained mattress lying on the floor, but it’s also covered with a layer of grime. We’re about to leave when I see a closet against one wall in the back hallway. I motion to Roly to shine the light on it and I open the door. It’s full of coats, old waxed-canvas hunting jackets, tweed blazers, rain slickers. Everything smells like it’s been in here for fifty years. The floor is littered with Wellington boots and lace-up leather shoes. I’m about to turn around when I catch sight of a round, metal object on the floor. I cover my hand with the hem of my jacket and stoop to pick it up. It’s a button. It reads, “Sustainable Galway.”
And then I look up and see a door at the back of the closet with a padlock on it, also shiny and new.
“Roly!”
He shines the light on the door. My eyes are playing tricks on me now. I think I see something move, a mouse or an insect, but I’m not sure.
I knock on the door. Silence.
“What is it?”
“I don’t know. Some sort of crawl space?”
And that’s when I hear a faint thump, like someone hitting his or her body against the floor or a wall. It’s coming from behind the door.
“Roly! Help me with the padlock!” We pull at it but it holds fast.
“Is there someone in there?” I call out. “Is there someone in there?”
“It’s the Guards,” Roly calls. “You’re safe now. My name is Detective Inspector Roland Byrne.” We’re both silent, listening, and then it comes again, a faint thumping.
“Christ.” Roly kicks the door. “I’m going to go get a crowbar out of the boot. Stay here, D’arcy. I’ll radio the station in Roundwood and get some backup. Just sit tight for a moment.”
He takes the light with him so he can see where he’s going.
I hear his footsteps go out through the main room and then the soft catch of the lock as he goes out the door.
My heart is thudding in my chest. The house settles down around me, I say my name, pressing my lips against the wall, shouting as loudly as I can. “Are you in there? Can you knock twice if your name is Niamh Horrigan?”
A faint knocking comes from the other side of the wall. “Lots of people are looking for you, Niamh. Lots of people want to get you to safety. We’re here now. Your parents are nearby. They’ll be here soon. You’re safe now.” I press my hand against the wall.
It’s completely dark in the closet. “Hang on,” I say. “Hang on. He’s coming.”
I count to sixty, then count again, and again. It’s been five minutes, too long. My hand goes instinctively to my left waistband. My service weapon is at home in Alexandria, locked in the gun safe in my bedroom. I have never wished for it quite as much as I do right now.
Seven minutes.
Eight minutes.
Too long.
“Roly?” I whisper into the darkness. “Roly?”
The house is absolutely silent. Then footsteps, very quiet.
I know. I feel him rather than hear him. I’m trapped in the closet. I need to get out into the open, where I might be able to fight. I slide along the wall and around the corner, into the living room. I remember seeing a fire poker leaning next to the fire. If I can get to it, I might have a chance.
But he’s on me before I can do anything. He puts his hand over my mouth and locks a leg around my waist, wrestling me to the floor. I hear his voice and I know who it is.
“Shut up. Don’t make any noise,” he whispers hoarsely. “Is anyone else coming?”
“Yes.” I gasp. “Backup. He called for backup. You better go. They’ll be here any minute.”
“I got him before he rang,” he says seriously and it’s only then that I see the knife.
Roly.
I feel myself start to panic, my breathing becoming shallow and inefficient. Calm down. Make a plan. I can smell his sweat, his breath.
“How did you know we were here?” I ask, as loud as I can make my voice, which is barely above a whisper.
“I have a camera on the driveway. The footage streamed to my computer when you came earlier.”
“Did you kill my cousin?” I whisper.
He doesn’t say anything. He’s busy. He has my arms behind me now and I hear a ripping noise; when I feel him wrapping my wrists, I know what it is: duct tape.
I’m virtually incapacitated now. When you get someone’s hands secured like this it’s not just that they can’t use them, it’s that you take away their balance. Standing, I won’t have much of a chance, but if I can stay on the ground, I can use my legs.
I roll over onto my side, bringing my knees up to my chest. I wait until he rolls back onto his knees, until his head is in the strike zone in front of me.
And then I slam my feet against the side of his head.
I hear him grunt. I got him, but not hard enough. He swears and grabs my shoulders, pulling me up to standing.
And then he starts pushing me toward the closet.
“No!” I’m thrashing around, trying to get us away from the doorway. If he puts me in there, that’s it. For me, for Niamh Horrigan.
Erin.
“Shut up, you fucking bitch. Shut up!” And he raises the knife high above his head and I close my eyes.
Lilly.
And then I hear glass breaking and a second later what sounds like a shot and Cathal Deasey is rolling off me as the sirens scream and suddenly the room is full of light. There’s one more gunshot, an explosion in the center of the chaos.