Death Row - Mark Pearson [106]
*
Gloria stood by the window, looking through a small gap in the curtains as Sally nosed her car out into the traffic and moved off. She continued to lean against the cool glass, feeling it on her forehead. Then she stood back and took the towel off her head, running her delicate fingers through the smooth dry hair.
She tossed the towel aside and walked over to the opposite wall. Looking at her montage of photos and articles. The yellow light from the street lamp outside spilled through the gap in the curtain to throw a slash of sulphur-yellow light across the wall, catching the picture of Peter Garnier and giving his eyes a feral, alien look. She looked at the photo of Jack Delaney holding her when she’d been rescued as a seven-year-old girl. Then she pulled her robe tight around herself and dropped her right hand, letting it come rest on a motorcycle helmet on the side table beneath the picture.
‘Turns out you couldn’t save them all,’ she said as she stared at the man in uniform holding her in his arms. ‘Could you, Jack?’
‘Has he gone?’
Gloria turned round and nodded. ‘Yes, George. He’s gone.’
‘Good. Get dressed, then.’
*
Sally Cartwright pulled the car to a stop in the White City police station car park and turned off the engine. Delaney snapped his seat belt off and reached for the door handle. Then he looked back at Sally who seemed a bit lost in thought. ‘Something on your mind, detective constable?’
‘Just wondering how Garnier is getting messages out, sir. He doesn’t have access to the internet, he’s never alone with a guard. None of them are. He’s had no mail, no visitors apart from Maureen Gallagher. Who’s now dead. So we know she’s not involved.’
‘Somebody else in there, someone who does have visitors, you think? Somebody from the outside who’s carrying messages to one of the two men in the photo?’ asked Delaney.
‘He’s talking to someone, sir.’
Delaney looked at her for a long moment, the synapses in his brain firing as he turned her words over and over. Then he smiled. ‘Of course he’s talking to someone. And he told me who it is the very first time I visited him.’
‘I don’t understand, sir. Who?’
Delaney pulled out the photo of the five men and handed it to her. ‘Like we thought, it’s one of these two men, and I know which one.’
Sally looked at the photo and would have asked Delaney a further question but he held up a finger to silence her. Then he took out his phone and notebook and flipped through it until he came to a number and punched it in. After a few seconds the phone was answered.
‘Father Carson Brown? It’s Detective Inspector Jack Delaney. Are you in your office? Good. Could you look up for me the name of the priest in charge of your church in the summer of 1995?’ Delaney waited for a while as the priest did as he was asked and then wrote down the name that Carson Brown gave him. ‘Thank you, Father,’ said Delaney and clicked off the phone. Sally started to speak again but once more Delaney held up a finger as he punched in another phone number. He pointed at the photo as he waited for his call to be answered. ‘The man in black, Sally,’ he said. ‘Who wears black suits?’
Sally got it immediately. ‘He’s a priest!’
‘Garnier said he converted to Catholicism six months ago. I knew he was lying but I couldn’t see why.’
‘Why, then?’
‘The confessional, Sally. His old associate started visiting the prison and so he got to have a private conversation with him every Sunday. That’s who he’s been talking to.’
‘Oh my God.’
Someone at the other end of Delaney’s phone call finally answered. ‘Governor, it’s Jack Delaney. I’ve got two questions for you. The priest who visits to conduct the Catholic Mass on a Sunday … is his name Father Michael Fitzpatrick?’ He nodded, pleased. ‘Second question, then: what’s his address?’
As Delaney waited for the governor to look it up he flashed a triumphant grin at Sally. ‘We’ve got the bastard!’
Sally blew out a sigh. ‘Let’s just hope we’re in time, then.’
*
Delaney and Sally Cartwright rushed up the pavement.