Borderlands

beside us were staring open-mouthed at me. I stepped outside, fumbling in my pocket for my cigarettes as I spoke.

'No.'

'Are you sure?' No response. 'What about Ratsy Donaghey? Was he one of yours?'

'It's a well-known fact, Devlin. The priest told me that-'

'So Ratsy Donaghey didn't have anything to do with Knox's disappearance?'

'I didn't say that. Listen. We did not sanction the… disappearance of Mary Knox. Whether one renegade volunteer did is another matter and one for which we accept no responsibility. Such behaviour reflects badly on us.'

'I hardly think you're in a position of moral highground,' I began.

'The priest told us you were a decent fella,' the voice said. 'He was wrong. I can understand why they torched your car. Don't look for this to happen again.'

'Wait,' I said. 'What about Johnny Cashell and Seamus Boyle?'

'Are you fucking stupid? They all worked together.' Then the line went dead.

I recorded the phone number that had shown on my display, a northern cellphone number. I phoned through to the Garda Telecomm Support Unit and asked them if they could trace it. Later that day, they contacted me to tell me that the number belonged to a ten-year-old who had reported it lost in her school some days earlier.

'Donaghey did it,' I said, having relayed the details of the conversation to Williams. 'He was IRA but acted outside of them.

When he went into drugs they cut him loose completely. But he must have done it.'

'How come the RUC couldn't get him?'

'Extradition proceedings in the '70s were fairly rare. Probably not worth the effort if they couldn't be sure the state would hand him over. Besides, they needed to prove it was him for a case. We don't have to prove anything. Suspicion is enough to get us going – give us something to work with. So, let's work on the assumption that Ratsy Donaghey did kill her. Let's say he stole her jewellery. That was the kind of lowlife he was. Twenty-five years later, his house is broken into and the jewellery stolen. So much time has passed he believes he's in the clear. No one will remember a bloody ring, he thinks. And it must be worth something. Maybe he wanted the insurance to cover it. Somehow, someone sees the ring on the stolen items list, though. They make the connection. Ratsy gets tortured and killed. What if it wasn't a rival drugs thing or questions about the ring? What if Ratsy was tortured until he spilled the whole truth on Mary Knox? What if he named names? Let's say he names Cashell and Boyle. A little while later, Cashell's daughter and Boyle's son both end up dead, with photographs of the dead woman, and Cashell wearing her ring.'

'How did they get the ring? Check all the jewellers' shops until they get a hit? Follow it back to Whitey McKelvey, get the ring and set him up? None of the jewellers mentioned anyone asking questions except us, and it's our job to do that!'

'Well, who else would have access to the stolen items lists?'

'Don't you read your email? Another new initiative – stolen item lists are being put on the local page of the Garda website. Someone somewhere hopes that the public will do our job for us. Anyone with Internet access could have seen those lists.'

'True enough,' I agreed reluctantly. 'So someone sees the ring on a list; links it to Ratsy. Questions him; makes the connection with Whitey? How?'

'Luck? Grapevine? Sheer coincidence? Maybe Ratsy knew

McKelvey had done it. Must be easy enough to work out who's pawning stolen goods in Donegal,' Williams said. 'The more pertinent question is who would want to kill Mary Knox's killers – assuming she is actually dead?'

'She's dead. Who'd revenge her death? Someone close to her; someone who knew the ring; someone who knew her personally; someone who remembered her after twenty-five years.'

'Costello?' Williams said, shrugging slightly as she said it.

'Possibly,' I said, pretending it hadn't crossed my mind.

'Why kill Angela Cashell? Or Terry Boyle?' Williams said. 'Why not kill the fathers? Why pick on their children?'

'Unless it's Mary Knox's child who is taking revenge. Maybe he'd kill the children of those responsible for his mother's death.'

'Or she.'

'What?'

'Knox had two children, a boy and a girl. Don't forget, we haven't ruled out a woman's involvement in Cashell's murder. The panties back on? And we know there were two people involved in Boyle's murder: the girl he left the pub with and the person who shot him.'

'True,' I said.

'So, what do we do now?' Williams asked.

'We'll speak to Cashell and see what he gives us. Have a chat with Boyle tomorrow, after the funeral. Meanwhile, let's see if we can connect Donaghey and Cashell to the Knox murder. And let's see if we can track down what has happened to the two Knox children.'

Williams looked at me. 'What if we find it's Costello?' she asked, biting hard at her bottom lip.

'Then we arrest him,' I said, with more conviction than I felt.

We arrived at Cashell's home just as a TV crew pulled away. Johnny was talking over the hedge to his neighbour, Sadie beside him, smoking a cigarette.

The neighbour nodded in our direction and both the Cashells turned and watched us walking up the pathway to their house.

Johnny Cashell stood a little taller and tried to puff out his chest. The effect was diminished somewhat by the fact that he winced – his stomach wound was obviously still hurting him.

'Do I smell bacon?' his neighbour asked, obviously thinking a joke good enough to make once was worth repeating.

'Not over the smell of petrol,' Johnny Cashell replied, turning and standing in his doorway, legs slightly apart, arms folded across his chest. 'What do you want?' he sneered. 'Here to make more accusations about a grieving father? I were just telling the telly people about you. Couldn't solve a fucking jigsaw, so you blame the family.'

'I wanted to return this to Sadie,' I said, walking towards him holding the ring out. 'You'll recognize it, I think, Johnny. Though I dare say the last time you saw it Ratsy Donaghey was pulling it off the finger of a dead woman. Would I be right?'

Sadie stared incredulously, then turned to the neighbour, as if looking for him to share her sense of injustice. Johnny was not quite so blasй. He peered at the ring and a glimmer of recognition registered in his eyes. His tongue flicked nervously on his lips and he laughed just a little too loudly. 'More bullshit, Devlin. There are no depths-'

'There's no statute of limitations, either, Johnny. Doesn't it bother you that Angela died for this? Or that Donaghey set you up, you ignorant bastard?' My voice was rising now and I could feel my muscles begin to hum. Williams curled her hand around my upper arm.

'Best we speak inside, Mr Cashell, don't you think?' she said, guiding the Cashells into their house while I followed. Sadie quizzed her husband in whispers about what I had said.

I placed the picture of Mary Knox on the table and stood facing the Cashells. 'We know the ring belonged to Mary Knox, Johnny. We suspect that Tony Donaghey took it from her at the time she disappeared. The ring has resurfaced now, twenty-five years later, and Donaghey has paid the price for it. Someone caught up with him in Bundoran a few weeks ago.'

I watched Johnny Cashell attempt to keep his poker face in place. 'Someone tied him up Johnny,' I continued, 'burnt him with lit cigarettes, shoved rags down his throat, and then cut his arms open from the wrist to the elbow and probably made him watch his blood run down his legs along with his piss.' If nothing else, I had got their attention. 'Now you can sit with your 'Fuck the Guards' expression, Johnny,' I went on, years of frustration at people as stupid and intractable as Johnny Cashell finally boiling over, 'but at some point in all that, Ratsy lived up to his name and gave out yours and Seamus Boyle's to whoever did him in. Hey presto, two weeks later, your innocent daughter is lying cold in a field, while you sit in the pub talking about what a big man you are. I'm sure you're very proud of your husband, Sadie. You got a real catch.'