Dark Dawn (ds o'neill) Read online

  Dark Dawn

  ( DS O'Neill )

  Matt Mcguire

  Matt McGuire

  Dark Dawn

  ONE

  Belfast, 2005

  It was January. It was raining. The kid was dead.

  DS O’Neill pulled on his cigarette as rain drummed on the makeshift roof of Laganview Apartments. They were only a shell: steel girders, concrete foundations. The latest luxury in waterfront living. The new Northern Ireland. Least that’s what the billboard said.

  Thirty yards away a couple of uniforms stood behind a band of yellow police tape. They were in a hurry. They always were. Coming off a nightshift, the last thing you wanted was to end up babysitting a stiff. It was solid peeler logic. Protect and serve, so long as you’re not freezing your balls off in the rain for six hours.

  O’Neill looked at the body. The arched back, the pale face, the empty eyes that stared down the river and out to sea. He took a drag of his cigarette. Yeah. There was no rush. The kid was dead. He was dead when they arrived. He’d still be dead in ten minutes.

  It was eight o’clock, Monday morning. Half an hour earlier the call had come into Musgrave Street — suspicious death. A low buzz went round the station. You couldn’t say it, but CID liked a body. Burglary, robbery, theft — sure, they had their moments. But a body? A body was the real deal. Sharpened the mind. Put an inch to your step. You spent weeks, months, wading through the same bullshit. The same bag-snatching, same robbery, same aggravated assault. A body though, a body was a headline-grabber. Even in the North. There was something about a body, something that couldn’t be denied. In a world of ‘no comment’, of ‘where’s my lawyer’, of half-truths and outright lies, a body was irrefutable. It was a fact. It couldn’t be ignored.

  O’Neill looked at the wall of grey cloud that pressed down upon Belfast. It was January, almost February. Christmas was a distant memory. There was still no sign of spring. A line of police tape sealed off the entrance to the building site. CRIME SCENE DO NOT CROSS. Behind it the two uniforms swayed from foot to foot. They wore black boots, dark trousers and high-vis jackets. Fluorescent yellow was cut in two by a belt holding a pair of bracelets and the standard issue Glock 19. At the gates to Laganview two armoured Land Rovers stood guard like a couple of bouncers. They were dirty white with heavy grilles across the windscreen. One of them was scarred down the side — charred from some ‘community relations’ work in the Ardoyne the previous week.

  The apartments overlooked the River Lagan as it gathered pace before spilling its guts into Belfast Lough. Across the water, the morning rush-hour crawled along Oxford Street. People huddled in their cars listening to Radio Ulster, oblivious to the contorted figure that lay on the far side of the river.

  Detective Sergeant John O’Neill was anything but oblivious. He was thirty-four, but looked closer to forty. Six years of shift-work would do that to you. Beneath the suit O’Neill wore a medal, the size of a twenty-pence piece. St Michael, the patron saint of peelers. He didn’t believe in saints. Didn’t believe in God either. Catherine had given it to him when he joined up and he thought, What the hell, might as well have someone watching your back. O’Neill was six foot with black hair, going grey at the side. Catherine, his wife, used to joke about George Clooney. He told her: ‘Keep dreaming, love. It’s as close to him as you’re likely to get.’

  That was a couple of years ago. When there were still jokes. Now there were lawyers — or at least, it was heading that way. Every smartarse comment might end up costing O’Neill another couple of grand. They were ‘on a break’. Catherine’s words. It had been six months and still no one in the station knew. O’Neill was in a flat on the Stranmillis Road. Catherine had stayed in the house with Sarah, their five-year-old daughter. O’Neill had asked Jack Ward, the DI, what he knew about lawyers.

  Expensive.

  That’s what he figured.

  It might not come to that though. There was hope. There was Sarah to think about. She’d just started primary school at St Therese’s. O’Neill saw her on weekends, when his shifts allowed. Divorced at thirty-four. Christ, O’Neill thought, you fairly fucked that up in a hurry.

  He looked at the body next to the river. Six years with the Police Service of Northern Ireland. It wasn’t the first time O’Neill had seen death. He’d seen it ooze out of people, a dark sickly red, as the lights slowly went out behind their eyes. He’d smelled it rotting, an old man on his sofa, six weeks before neighbours noticed the stink. He’d heard it gurgle and choke — a teenage joyrider who left a stolen car, doing seventy, via the front windscreen. At Laganview though it was the stillness. The perfect stillness. The river ran on, the rain poured down, the cars rolled by. The body, however — the body lay completely still. O’Neill kept waiting for the kid to blink, to get up and start rubbing his head. He’d look round, dazed, confused, and wonder what had happened. What was all the fuss about? O’Neill knew better though. The kid wouldn’t sit up. Wouldn’t rub his head. Wouldn’t look round him. He’d lie there. Dead still. At least until someone did something about it.

  Six years. O’Neill had seen things. You couldn’t not see things, that was the job. When he signed up, he thought that’s what he wanted. To see things. To be the guy that got the call. The guy that didn’t walk away, that didn’t look away, like everyone else. He looked at the body of the twisted teenager and thought to himself: Be careful what you wish for.

  O’Neill took his time, working his way down a second cigarette. You never rushed a crime scene. He knew this. Knew it deep down, like a form of muscle memory. When he’d first stepped out of the car, his stride automatically slowed and his gestures had become deliberate, more measured. His eyes changed. He stopped looking at things and started to stare. He stared at objects. He stared at sightlines. He stared at people. Bystanders, witnesses, onlookers. O’Neill knew the nightmare stories. A detective not controlling his scene. Some uniform, three weeks out of Police College, picks up a knife — ‘I’ve got something here.’ Yes, you do, mate. It’s a ‘Get Out of Jail Free Card’ for some lucky bastard. Plus a month’s paperwork and a ball-chewing for me. And Uniform wondered why CID didn’t always like them.

  O’Neill remembered a conversation with the DI, Jack Ward, three weeks after he first came over to CID. The shift was asking itself the usual question: was O’Neill just another monkey out of uniform, better suited to wrestling drunks and handing out parking tickets? Ward was ex-RUC. He was in his fifties and had earned his stripes during the Troubles: 25 years, 300 dead peelers. The numbers didn’t lie.

  A robbery had come in and O’Neill grabbed his coat. He needed to prove himself, show he was a worker, that he had what it took. He hadn’t popped his cherry and was still chasing his first collar. Ward stood in the doorway, smiling.

  ‘Detective O’Neill. A question for you. But only if you have time. .’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Why don’t they put blue lights on the cars in CID?’

  O’Neill paused. The other DCs had been taking the piss since he arrived and it sounded like more of the same.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Why don’t CID have blue lights, like everyone else?’

  O’Neill didn’t answer.

  ‘I’ll tell you,’ Ward continued. ‘Because. . by the time we get the call, the emergency’s over.’

  The other DCs in the room, Kearney and Reid, laughed. The Charge of the Blue Light Brigade. That was what Ward called it.

  ‘Chasing guys down streets. Rugby tackles. Rolling in the dirt. Jesus. You guys watch too much TV.’ He looked round the room. ‘We’re the clean-up crew. We walk. We don’t run. By the time they send for us, the party’s always over. Our job’s to find out who made the mess.’

>   Three weeks later, O’Neill was up to his elbows. He’d ten jobs open. Five assaults, three thefts and two robberies. Ward asked: ‘What do you think’ll happen as soon as you clear one of those?’

  ‘I get another?’

  ‘Bingo. Sisyphus, son. That’s who you are.’

  ‘Sissy who?’

  Ward laughed as he walked away. ‘Never worry. You just keep rolling that boulder. Shit. We might even make a detective out of you one of these days.’

  O’Neill looked down at the lifeless body. Six years on and somewhere along the way, somewhere amid the sights and the smells, the interviews and the bullshit, the paperwork and the procedure, they had made a detective out of him. Of that much O’Neill was sure.

  As he waited for DI Ward, O’Neill drew an aerial sketch of Laganview on his notepad. The site was a rectangle, 40 by 100 yards or so, hugging the bank of the river. Three apartment blocks filled what used to be the old Sirocco steelworks. Late to the party, Belfast was getting the same makeover that Glasgow, Newcastle and Liverpool got in the 1990s. Old factories were becoming apartment blocks. Disused dockyards were transformed into high-end lofts. It was a building epidemic. The Belfast skyline was dotted with cranes, swinging their arms over the city in a mass benediction. Progress meant property. The Cathedral Quarter. The Titanic Quarter. The Gasworks. The Troubles were over. There was money to be made.

  Laganview looked across the river towards the 50-foot high curves of the Waterfront Hall. Next door stood the Hilton Hotel and the white limestone of Belfast City Court House. The apartments rubbed shoulders with the Short Strand and the Markets, working-class areas, where rows of terrace houses formed a maze of side-streets and alleyways. During the Troubles they were a no-go area for police, a breeding ground for militant Republicans. Kerbstones were still painted green, white and gold. Gable ends featured 20-foot murals. Slogans in Irish. O’Neill imagined buyers walking round Laganview, looking down on the streets below. The salesman would tell them to focus on the view. Keep their eyes on the horizon. There was a lot of that going on these days.

  O’Neill put his notebook away and stood under the corrugated iron roof. He pulled smoke into his lungs, the nicotine peeling back the lack of sleep from the night before. Jack Ward arrived and picked his way across the rubble. Ward was fifty-six, stocky, and wore a black trenchcoat. He was a good boss and trusted his troops to get on with things. Ward spoke slowly and was quiet and watchful. He gave the impression he’d seen it all before, that nothing would surprise him. The DI was eighteen months away from retirement, one of the few senior CID officers who had stayed on after the Peace Process. It was the release of all the prisoners that sparked the mass exodus. Ward remembered standing in Musgrave Street canteen, watching the TV. Men walked out of prison. A quick pump of the fist before ducking into waiting cars. Ward knew half of them by name. They’d spent years murdering peelers. He’d spent his career trying to put them behind bars. Now they were out. All of them. In the corner of the room Jackie Robinson, a DC of ten years, puked in a bin. Tony Callaghan, one of the other DIs, summed it up rather eloquently.

  ‘Fuck this.’

  Callaghan was gone within six months. It seemed like half the force had the same idea. Guys with fifteen, twenty years on them. All gone. Ward had stayed on though, holding his ground, keeping his counsel. Something in him couldn’t walk. At least not yet.

  Six years on, standing next to O’Neill, he pulled a packet of B amp;H from his jacket and lit one. Ward looked at the ground by their feet.

  ‘Two fags? Christ. You’re really drinking this one in.’

  Ward was relaxed with his troops. Occasionally he sounded like an old schoolteacher; everyone still ‘sir-ed’ him, out of respect more than anything. The two detectives stared at the scene. Their eyes moved over objects, holding them for a moment, committing them to memory. O’Neill looked at the rain, then up at the dark, threatening sky.

  ‘Reckon someone up there doesn’t like us, sir?’

  Ward laughed quietly. ‘You only figuring that out now?’

  Ward looked at the body in the grey tracksuit. He nodded, pointing his cigarette.

  ‘You see? That’s why I never go jogging.’

  O’Neill smiled. Nothing came between a peeler and his attitude. He had learned that during his first week in CID. He glanced at the billboard where powerful up-lights illuminated a finished version of Laganview Apartments. The building was a glistening silver cube, all glass and mirrors.

  ‘I don’t know, sir. I could see you in one of these yuppie flats.’

  Ward glanced sideways. ‘On my salary, son? I wouldn’t believe everything you heard in Police College.’

  It had rained all morning and looked like it was on for the day. O’Neill imagined the waters rising over Belfast. A second Great Flood. Christ knew, the place could do with it.

  ‘Take your time here,’ Ward announced. ‘I’m putting you up front on this one.’

  O’Neill swallowed hard. He’d worked Suspicious Death before but only in a support role, never as Principal Investigator. PI meant calling the shots. Bodies were a big deal, even in Northern Ireland. There would be SOCOs, Forensics, the pathologist, not to mention the press and top brass, all breathing down his neck. When a body turned up, people wanted to know.

  On the drive from Musgrave Street Ward had thought through his options before deciding to give O’Neill the case. O’Neill had been an Acting Sergeant for nine months and it would be his first major case as PI. It was a big call. Bob Townsend, the regular DS, was on secondment and due back next month. The Review Boards were coming up and Ward knew the Chief Inspector, Charles Wilson, wanted O’Neill out of CID and back in uniform. If the truth be told, Wilson wanted O’Neill gone altogether. Uniform would do though, for the time being. Wilson didn’t like O’Neill. As a DC he’d made the fatal mistake of disagreeing with the Chief Inspector in front of people. It was two years ago and something pretty minor, but the Chief Inspector didn’t forget. He reckoned O’Neill wasn’t cut out for CID. He was wrong — Ward knew it. He’d watched O’Neill for three years. Sure, he was a bit rough round the edges and he made mistakes, but once he bit on to something, he didn’t let go. O’Neill was the real thing. He was just enough of a stubborn arsehole to be a really good detective.

  None of that mattered though. Not to Wilson. The Review Boards were next month and the Chief Inspector would make his move there. Being sent back to uniform would mark O’Neill out. He’d be damaged goods. Everyone would know it. His only hope was to have a big case under his belt, and they didn’t come much bigger than a murder. If O’Neill could wrap Laganview up before the Review Boards, Wilson wouldn’t be able to touch him.

  The Chief Inspector was a new breed. Twenty-first-century police. A company man. An accountant. Happier in meetings, reading reports, compiling budgets. Flying off across the water to drink cups of coffee with other number-crunchers from the Met, Greater Manchester Police, Lothian and Borders. Don’t ask him to solve a crime though. The last place you wanted Wilson was on a job, knocking on a door, interviewing a suspect.

  Ward had watched over the last ten years as a slew of Wilsons came in and slowly took over the force. He knew one thing: they might wear a uniform, but they weren’t peelers. They thought crime could be solved with spreadsheets and graphs, with statistics and pie charts. And when they opened their mouths they sounded more like politicians than cops. They played the angles and made the right friends. They were never happier than when they were getting their mugs on TV. He’d seen a generation of Wilsons rise up the rank — at the same time as he was passed over.

  ‘Next time, Jack. There’s always next time.’

  It was bullshit and Ward knew it. He was too old. His face didn’t fit. He didn’t speak the lingo. He would retire next year anyway, leave the force to Wilson and the rest of the bean-counters.

  There was still O’Neill though. O’Neill was a peeler. A real peeler. On the drive over to Laganview, Ward had come up
with an idea. What if he left O’Neill behind him. Make him the stone in Wilson’s shoe. Always there. Niggling away. Ward had smiled at the thought. He knew it wasn’t just about Wilson though. It wasn’t just some personal vendetta. It was bigger than that. The North needed peelers like O’Neill. Now more than ever. It needed guys to get out there, to get involved, to get their hands dirty. Hiding in meetings, ducking behind spreadsheets. . what did that ever get done?

  ***

  Standing beside Ward, O’Neill studied the area round the body. The SOCOs were on their way with a tent. Protect the integrity of the scene. He remembered his Locard from Police College: the first rule of forensic science, every contact leaves a trace. O’Neill looked at the rain. Most of the forensics would have washed into the river and be halfway to Scotland by now. Maybe the rules didn’t apply in Belfast.

  O’Neill still hadn’t gone near the body. When the SOCOs arrived they’d begin from the perimeter and work their way in, in everdecreasing circles. They’d go slowly, patiently, following the golden rule which says there may be only one crime scene, but there are many ways to fuck it up.

  The body was an IC1 male. Late teens, pale and skinny, with hollow cheeks and a shaved head. The most important question was, who was he? Ninety per cent of homicides were committed by someone who knew the victim. A neighbour, a friend, a relative. That was right. In a detective’s litany of cynical thoughts, the nearest and dearest were never excluded from the list. Random attacks? Stranger danger? Ward was right. People watched too much TV. Start with his mates, call them killers, see who blinks. Find out who the victim was, you were halfway to finding out who killed him.

  The kid’s grey tracksuit was wet through. A 3-foot pool of red spread out from his head, mixing with a puddle of rainwater. They would wait for the pathologist, but it looked like a fatal head wound that finally turned the lights out.

  O’Neill ran his eyes the length of the body. The legs were wrong. Twisted out of shape, like an Action Man tossed away by a child. Was he a jumper? O’Neill looked at the roof of the apartment block, 30 feet away. Not unless he was Jesse Owens.