Page 91 of Three Widows

At the mention of Chloe’s workplace, she immediately forgot about going to the toilet. ‘What about Fallon’s?’

‘Right. Sure. The barman… barperson… sorry, I don’t know the right term…’

‘Get on with it, please.’

‘She said it was an unusually busy lunchtime. But two women came in before the rush and sat in a corner for nearly an hour. She remembers them because one of them kept ordering for the other and she needed the table. From her description, one of the women could be Helena McCaul.’

‘Two women on their own?’

‘That’s what she said. She also said your Chloe and a little boy called in for lunch.’

Lottie opened her eyes wide at this news, surprised that Chloe would go anywhere near where she worked, especially with Sergio. She hoped Boyd wouldn’t be angry over it.

‘Fallon’s has security cameras. Go back and ask for the footage from when those women entered the pub.’

‘I’ll head back there straight away. Sorry. I should have… you know… sorry…’

She shook her head as Lei disappeared at a sprint. Did she have to draw a map for them all? Enough with the questions, she thought. She needed bloody answers. Right after she had a pee in peace.

* * *

McKeown was of the opinion that the security footage on the two DVDs that Garda Lei had dumped on his desk would be useless. Everyone and their father knew pubs installed security cameras to watch their staff rather than the customers. He’d had no luck finding anything on the tapes from Ballyglass Business Park, where Jennifer’s body had been found. The additional garage forecourt footage that the boss had requested had thrown up nothing of interest. The idea of trawling through the pub’s grainy images filled him with boredom. But just to be thorough and not give the boss anything else to beat him with, he decided to rush through the DVDs.

And he got lucky. The first was from a camera trained on the toilet doors at the end of the bar, but captured the table to the left of it. There they were. Two women seated at a small, round table, heads close, apparently in deep conversation. Definitely Orla Keating and Helena McCaul. He fast-forwarded until they stood up and moved out of sight.

He shoved in the second DVD. This showed the alcove at the front entrance, and he caught sight of them as they stepped outside the door. He figured the camera was positioned just above their heads. Probably there to catch antisocial behaviour.

He kept his eyes on the women as they moved out onto the footpath. He noticed Orla Keating’s hand on Helena’s back. Was she pushing or steering her? The image was too grainy to be sure. They turned left as they exited the pub. Helena’s shop was close by, and the car park was that way also. He phoned the council office requesting all footage from the car park within the relevant timeline.

‘I need it like yesterday,’ he told the bored woman on the phone; then, softening his tone, he tried his charm. ‘We’ve had two murders in two days. You don’t want that to happen to anyone else in Ragmullin, do you?’

He hung up after getting a promise of the footage as soon as she could obtain it from the council databank, and a possible coffee date.

The charm still worked. Kirby was welcome to Martina. McKeown was already moving on.

The woman at the council emailed the footage within an hour.

It was grainy and difficult to locate the women, but squinting at the images, he eventually spotted them getting into a car. He checked the registration number. It belonged to Helena McCaul.

Orla Keating sat into the driver’s seat. Neither woman looked coerced or too inebriated, but he couldn’t be sure.

As the vehicle exited the car park, he noticed someone loitering at the fence. Were they watching the car? Was the figure male or female? They were dressed all in black and it struck him it could be someone in the supermarket uniform. The supermarket was next to the car park. But what made him think it was suspicious was that the instant the car disappeared from the camera view, the person did too. They didn’t enter the car park or walk along the fence in the direction they were facing. They had to have turned and gone back the way they’d come.

Could he be sure the person was watching the two women? Or was it just someone on a break from work having a smoke? Or had they been going to their car and then changed their mind?

He groaned and ran his hand over his shaved head, then tugged at his chin in irritation. It was likely irrelevant. His job was to find where the women had gone. He’d have to alert traffic cams and trawl more footage to track their journey. To tie up the loose end with the unidentified watcher, he’d need to trace security footage up along the footpath to the car park and back again. Maybe he could keep his mouth shut and ignore it. Who would even know?

He was considering his dilemma when his phone rang.

The woman from the council.

He smiled and answered the call.

59

With the investigations at a stalemate, Lottie headed home after telling her team there would be a debrief meeting at seven the next morning.

Kirby had filled her in on his initial glance through the solicitor’s files found in Jennifer’s lock-up. They were related to property transactions, including the purchase of the Keating house. Why keep copies of work files hidden? Why have them at all? She didn’t want to get caught up in something that might have nothing to with the murders, but she’d still have to call on Bowen Solicitors tomorrow to see why their files had turned up in a murdered woman’s lock-up.