“I’m coming back in ten minutes, and I may have to do for you. It might be quick, and it might be slow. It all depends on you. You’re quick enough with the wit when you want to be, but this is not the time or the place for smart remarks. Think hard now, mister polisman. I’ll be back. If you’re still at this codology, it’ll be all over.”
Minogue heard the footsteps cross the room. The others seemed to be leaving too.
“Leave the bag on him,” said the stranger. “Get him used to the dark.”
Minutes passed. Fear blurred his mind and he lost track of time. When the door scraped, Minogue’s heart leapt. The absurd plea almost came out in words: That wasn’t ten minutes… They had given up on him, they were going to just kill him because they were losing control of the situation and the time.
“Who’s there? Who is it?”
He strained again to hear any movement. The ends of his fingers began to tingle.
“Who’s-” A choking sob erupted behind his tongue and his voice broke.
“Ah,” came her voice. “You’re good and scared now, aren’t you?”
Her footsteps behind him, slow.
“You’d better tell them, you know.”
Minogue realised that his eyes were wide open. His heart was thudding as if it were outside his body. He couldn’t utter a word.
“Do you hear me? Tell them. What’s the use of trying to keep it in? What’s it worth now?”
“But there’s nothing I can tell them,” he gasped. “I’ve told the truth and they don’t seem to-”
“Don’t play that again now,” she said with a faint snort which he read as impatience. “Tell them.”
“I can’t-there’s nothing.”
He heard her move to his right side. Her voice dropped to a whisper.
“Tell me then. It was me you wanted, wasn’t it?”
The panic blocked his words again.
“Come on. Stupid, you’re not. I could tell that right away-”
“People think I know what’s happening around here, that’s what’s so-”
“They sent you because you’re from here. You’re an insider. Come on now, don’t be wasting time. They’re serious out there. They’re waiting for a lead from you-”
“‘We,’ you mean, don’t you?” he managed to say.
Sheila Howard made no reply.
“It was Crossan persuaded me that the Jane Clark case stank-”
“Look. Do you think that time is on your side here? That you can buy time? That they’ll forget about you or something? They’ll have to decide about you pretty soon.”
“‘They’?” Minogue risked. “You should know. You’re in cahoots with them. They treat you like dirt. Why would you want to-”
“Oh, shut up about that, would you? He wasn’t like this. It’s all eaten away at him, this whole thing, and he forgets sometimes. That’s how he…
“Oh what the hell would you understand?” she whispered. “Just shut up talking about that! Can’t you see? You’re the one in trouble. Start acting like you know it. What did Naughton tell you?”
The name caught Minogue off-guard.
“Well? What did he tell you?”
“He told me several things. He told me that your husband is a fool, for one thing. Then he told me that nobody called the station the night of the fire. I tried to get him to explain but he got into a dander. He took a few swipes at me and Shea-”
“That’s just it! You brought more Guards into this. What for?”
Minogue’s mind reeled. Where could he begin to explain?
“You’re holding something back. What brought you up to the house this morning?”
“You didn’t tell me that you’d left the pub in a huff after some row with Dan Howard’s father.”
“After some row. Oh, Christ, what do you know? What do you think happened that night, then?”
His panic had begun to ease and he realised that talking was giving him back some of his composure. He thought of lying to her but his words came out before he had calculated his reply.
“I think you took the car out to her cottage and you had it out with Jane Clark.”
“Had it out?” Toying with him.
“Argued, fought. I don’t know.”
“Do you think I killed her?”
He knew by her voice that she was half-smiling.
“I don’t know. She might have been in your way. I really don’t know.”
“God, you’re stupid. At the same time as being smart.” Her mood had changed again, he realized.
“Not like Romeo out there?”
She slapped him across the face before he could sense her anger.
“You bastard. Peeping Tom. You think I didn’t see you gawking?”
Something in him was satisfied to have had this effect on her. He had his head down and away, waiting another blow. Nothing came.
“So they sent you in to work your spell on me,” he said.
“One last chance,” she replied, calm again. “They mean what they say. When they come back-”
“They’ll have to figure out what to do about you too-” His words were choked off by a coughing fit. “At least let me breathe so as I can talk,” he wheezed, and lapsed into another fit of coughing.
Suddenly the sack was off. The cold air of the room fell on his skin. He blinked and took in great mouthfuls of air. A light bulb on a long cord hung from a nail in the wall. Its glare stung at his eyes and he shut them tight again.
She began to walk slowly around the room and he followed her through a slit in his eyelids. She stopped and leaned against the wall facing him. Her hair was loose and hung out from her inclined head. In her right hand was an automatic pistol.
“Do you really think it’s worth it?” she whispered.
He tried to say something but it was a hoarse whistle that ended somewhere near his teeth. He tried to clear his throat.
“They’re not going to stop at this,” he croaked.
“Don’t be stupid,” she scoffed. “I’m a hostage.” He stared into the shadows where her eyes were. “You think they trust you so much, they’ll let you witness…?”
He couldn’t bring himself to finish the sentence. She shifted her weight onto her other leg.
“Christ. You really don’t have a clue, do you?”
He looked down to where her finger was rubbing against the outer rim of the trigger-guard.
“Let me tell you something now,” she went on. “You put most of the bits together and I have the feeling you could probably sort it out in the end. There was something about you that sort of… I told them too, that you could be a problem. But if you did get to the stage of putting bits together, you’d be in a lot of…trouble.”
“Why?”
“Because you’d have opened the door on something more important, that’s why. And you still want me to believe that you walked into the whole thing blind?”
He felt that something was rolling toward him, a wave about to crest and lift him high.
“Do you really want to know what happened?” she asked in a soft voice. “Do you?”
She shook her face clear of hair and leaned her shoulder against the wall again. Her head seemed to be shaking a little, he believed. In the space between them, Minogue dazedly took in her anger. She held her breath behind her teeth as she spoke.
“I went to Galway that day because I had an appointment. A doctor’s appointment. Why did I go to Galway? Because I didn’t want anyone knowing my business around here. The doctor, a man of course, Coughlan, he had a kind of a wart on his nose and it got redder. I remember looking at it and thinking that he had seen me staring at it and maybe he was mad at me for doing that. He told me I had an infection. As if I didn’t know. Looked at me like I was a tramp. Asks ‘Do you have more than one boyfriend, Miss Hanratty?’” She returned Minogue’s stare.
“You know what I’m talking about, don’t you?” she murmured.
Though her hair had fallen down again and her eyes had returned into the shadow, the Inspector could make
