Declan Hughes: The Color of Blood

“No one,” he said, unable to suppress the grin that spread across his face.

“What did you say to Shane Howard when you rang him on Halloween morning? What did you tell him?”

“Nothing. I didn’t ring him.”

“I have phone records that say you did.”

“You couldn’t, my phone is-”

“Untraceable, I know. And now I know for sure you made that call. You told him his wife was having an affair with David Brady, didn’t you?”

“No.”

“You’d already killed Brady by then. And you must have thought you were clever dodging the CCTV camera in the lobby. But there’s a camera across the road, and it’s got footage of the Reillys and their accomplice. That’s you, Jonathan.”

Jonathan shook his head.

“And after that, you went around to Jessica Howard, whom you also rang that morning, you went around and stabbed her to death too. Just the way you stabbed Denis Finnegan, straight through the heart. And then you went back to Honeypark, took a shower, dumped your clothes in the house, just the way you tried to make out Emily had had a shower and dumped her bloody clothes there-which is why you set fire to the place yesterday. Now this is what I think you were doing, Jonathan. You were working with Denis Finnegan, listening to his plans, the great Howard name, the construction of the fourth tower, the grandiose achievements that separate the likes of you, great men, from the likes of the rest of us, the little people who don’t have any castles or towers in our names, or portraits of ourselves on every wall. Denis knew all about the blackmail scheme involving the porn film-David Brady had sent it to him by e-mail attachment, so he may have felt it was a way of persuading Shane Howard to play ball on the development front. But then the Reillys were involved with their crude demands for cash, and the whole thing just became too much grief. Finnegan told Brady, and Brady tried to back out-but the Reillys weren’t having that. This was their chance for some long-term income, blackmailing Shane Howard. So between you and Wayne and Darren, the plot was hatched to get rid of David Brady. You didn’t like him anyway, did you Jonny? All the things Emily did with him. It should’ve been you, shouldn’t it?”

Jonathan was very still, his eyes blank now, his mouth set.

“Why you killed Jessica Howard is clearer, I think. She was actively opposed to the plan to build the fourth tower; she wanted to redevelop the site for apartments and town houses. That was bad for Denis, because with Jessica involved, there was no way he could bring Brock Taylor on board. And it was bad for you: apartments full of dreadful little people sullying the Howard name. So you went around there and you killed her. And you tried to set Shane Howard up for both murders.”

I was looking at Shane as I spoke. He couldn’t meet my eye.

“No, you’re completely wrong,” Jonathan said. “I didn’t kill Jessica.”

“But you did kill David Brady. And you did kill David Manuel. I found Emily’s laptop last night, in your room in Finnegan’s Mountjoy Square house. I thought at first Emily had been e-mailing David Manuel. But how could she, she didn’t have her computer. No, Jonathan, pretending to be Emily, negotiated an emergency late-night appointment with Manuel last night. Manuel knew too much, and wanted Emily to go to the cops. Jonathan went there, overpowered Manuel and set fire to his room. Manuel fell to his death, horribly burnt.”

Jonathan looked to his mother one last time; she seemed to be fading before our eyes, like a plant wilting for lack of water and light; she shook her head at him and turned away. He attempted a laugh, but it didn’t catch. His eyes burned with hatred; he looked like a trapped and wounded animal.

“I did my best for us,” he said. “But the only other person who gave a damn was Denis, and he should never have been allowed across the door. Now you can all go to hell.”

He bolted across the room and out the door. I thought Shane Howard might try and stop him, but he didn’t. Neither did I. I put the gun back in my pocket and called Dave Donnelly and told him what had happened and who I thought was responsible and where to come.

A FEW MINUTES LATER, EMILY HOWARD AND JERRYDalton appeared. Emily had the dollhouse under her arm and an excited, urgent look in her eye. She made straight for me but Denis Finnegan’s body brought her to a halt; she screamed at the sight of the dead man and shook her head in disbelief. I led her to a sofa and calmed her down and filled her in quickly on what had taken place. I left her sitting very still with the dollhouse on her lap and tears in her eyes, whatever she had been about to tell me lost to shock.

Sandra stared at Jerry Dalton blankly; when Shane and Emily explained who he was, she nodded. “Welcome to the family,” she said, with a dark smile on her face that failed to leaven the curse. I wanted to spare her any more pain. But we weren’t done yet.

“Jessica’s parents have arrived in the country. They’re staying at the Radisson,” I said to Sandra. “Her father, the one who isn’t a dead alcoholic actor, and her mother, who didn’t die of ovarian cancer.”

She looked at me as if she had hoped I’d let her off this, at least, as if what we’d been to each other should count for something. It did, but I couldn’t let her see that. Not until it was all finished. Maybe not even then. She winced, as if I had hit her, then nodded, walked from the fireplace to the nearest window and began to open the heavy green velvet curtains.

“Shut out the lights,” she said.

Jerry Dalton went around the room and turned all the lamps off. A cold light spilled in from outside, the deep blue before dawn on a clear day, the first for a long time. There were smears of pink in the sky; the three towers loomed ahead; below them, the dark city, asleep by the bay.

“I was first,” Sandra said. “And that made me feel important. I was thirteen, and he came to my room not long after I’d started my periods. It was exciting…we’d go for drives, and secret walks, and he’d always take me to rugby matches, and of course it was very exciting having secrets from everyone, Mother especially…I felt the others were such babies then…I don’t remember what I thought about the sex…it was messy, I remember thinking, and it seemed silly too, and then frightening when Father got so serious and intense about it all…but I can’t remember actually feeling anything, or rather I felt so many different things…love, fear, disloyalty, the thrill of the forbidden…that it was hard to unravel them from each other. I suppose that’s why it’s been an issue for me later…not that I didn’t enjoy it, I liked lots of things about it, but I don’t think I really felt anything, or enough…except with Stephen. Even if he was seventeen, we shouldn’t have been together. That was so intense. But maybe it was because it was forbidden, because I knew deep down it was wrong…

“Anyway, it ended with Father after two years. It got awful fairly quickly. I thought at first we might run away, that he might be mine, not Mother’s. But of course, when you realize…when I realized what it was…all it could ever be…well, then it just became disgusting. At first he’d bring me presents, new clothes, books, records…but then it became more about Mother not finding out than anything else…so after a while, he just left money under the pillow…I wasn’t even sure what a whore was yet, but I felt like one…so I just wouldn’t let him anymore. Well, that was all right, he didn’t force me…and then one night…Shane, I’m going to talk about this, is that okay?”

“Just keep going,” Shane Howard said.