Page 107 of Three Widows

‘Okay, don’t get uptight. Let’s look at this.’ She tapped a photo with her bitten biro top. ‘First up we have Orla Keating. You led the investigation into her husband’s disappearance. What did you make of her back then?’

Leaning against the desk behind him, Kirby folded his arms to keep his hands from twitching. He wanted to be out searching for Amy, but Lynch was right. He had to approach this logically.

‘Orla struck me as having been under Tyler’s control,’ he said. ‘Why did she wait five days to report him missing? That always bugged me. She told me she believed he was at a conference and she had no reason to suspect he was missing. And then when he didn’t return home, she reported it.’

‘She’d tried to contact him during those five days, hadn’t she?’

‘She phoned a few times, but the calls went unanswered. She said she assumed he was busy. I really think that marriage was on the rocks.’

‘Do you think she did something to her husband?’ Lynch queried.

‘I honestly don’t know. She said that when he didn’t return home she made enquiries and discovered he hadn’t turned up in Liverpool at all.’

‘It’s all a bit weird, to use your favourite word.’ She chewed the lid of her pen. ‘What else struck you about her?’

‘She was calm enough in the circumstances.’

‘You said she struck you as being under her husband’s control. Why did you think that?’

‘The house was shining when I visited the first time, but gradually she seemed to be losing her sense of how to keep it tidy. Not that I can talk, if you saw the state of my house. It’s just an observation.’

‘It might also be because she was struggling without knowing what had happened to him.’

‘I don’t think it was that.’

‘You think he was keeping her stuck at home as his little housewife, but when he was no longer around, she let things go?’

‘Maybe she felt a sense of freedom without him around.’

‘The statement from Jennifer O’Loughlin in the file, how did that come about?’

‘I’ve been thinking about that. When we went through Tyler’s home computer, we found he had a lot of correspondence with Damien O’Loughlin, who worked at Bowen Solicitors. I contacted his office at the time and was told he’d died the year before. They wouldn’t give me any information regarding his work with Tyler, so I called Damien’s wife to see if she could shed light on things. She agreed to make a statement.’

‘Did you not recognise her when we found her body?’

‘I didn’t take her statement. Never met her.’ He looked away, embarrassed. He should have made the connection with her name. Since the night with Amy his mind had not been fully on the job.

‘In Jennifer’s statement, she says she met Tyler three or four weeks before he disappeared. He commissioned a painting. But what was Damien doing for him other than his house contract?’

‘He specialised in conveyancing and wills. That kind of thing. Orla claimed not to know anything about it and Bowen Solicitors wouldn’t reveal any specific information. Tyler was missing, not dead.’

‘But it’s a year later; maybe they’ll tell you now.’

‘I can try. But I still have those files from the lock-up. I need time to examine them in more detail.’

Lynch sighed. ‘I found inconsistencies around timelines in the various interviews that Orla gave. I know she never had an airtight alibi, but first she said she was away the morning he was due to fly out. In another statement, she says she was in bed and didn’t hear him leave. Did you notice that?’

Kirby walked to the window and looked down into the yard. ‘Yes, and I asked her time and again about her whereabouts. She said she was so distraught that she kept getting confused. I grilled her as best I could, but in the end, I could never find any evidence to point to her having been involved in her husband’s disappearance.’

‘And now she can’t be found.’ Lynch sat down, pulling the keyboard close. ‘So we can’t ask her to explain.’

‘Why is Tyler’s car in Jennifer O’Loughlin’s lock-up? Bleached and cleaned. That’s a total mystery.’

‘Maybe she was more involved with him than just creating a painting for him.’

‘Whatever it was, Jennifer is dead, and because of his car being there, it’s possible she was involved in his disappearance.’

‘Or his murder,’ Lynch said.