‘How’s that?’
‘We understand you were a lot closer to Sandra Connolly than you led us to believe.’
‘I never said I didn’t care for the girl.’
Lynch took a step forward, hovering over him. ‘There’s caring, and then there’s abuse. You wouldn’t be the first teacher caught with your trousers down.’
Kate could hardly believe the speed by which the old man jumped up and grabbed Lynch by the throat. The detective responded by pinning him against the wall.
‘Look, let’s all settle down, shall we?’ Kate shouted. ‘This isn’t going to get us anywhere.’ The hatred in both men’s eyes was palpable.
Lynch reluctantly stood back, while Barry Lyons recomposed himself.
‘Barry,’ Kate said, ‘we have a number of questions for you.’
‘Ask me anything you want,’ he replied, sitting down again and cupping his face in his hands.
‘We believe Sandra Connolly has a direct link to our investigation. We also believe the two of you had a relationship.’
‘I never touched her. She wanted me to, but I never did.’
Kate watched as Barry Lyons’s face crumpled and tears formed in his eyes. He was hurting, she thought, and badly. ‘Tell us exactly what happened,’ she said.
He clenched his fists, his body and voice tensing more as he spoke. ‘She used to visit me some afternoons after school. It was a little irregular, I admit, but I felt sorry for her. I had the feeling she didn’t have anyone else. She would bring some artwork, keen to hear my observations on it.’ He looked away from Kate, staring ahead of him. ‘We had art lessons in the school, but not at the level Sandra had reached.’ He drew a deep breath. ‘She came to my house late one night …’ He swallowed hard. ‘I could tell she was upset, so I didn’t mention the hour. I went into the kitchen to make some cocoa. I told her to sit by the fire and get some warmth back into her.’
‘And what happened then?’ Lynch butted in, clearly fearful that Lyons might clam up.
Lyons was silent.
Kate tried again: ‘Listen, Barry, we know Sandra was promiscuous from a young age. If you didn’t do anything wrong, you’ve nothing to fear.’
He stared at her. ‘I wasn’t totally innocent either.’ His head dropped into his hands.
Kate gave him a few seconds to recover, and this time, so did Lynch.
Splaying his fingers on the table, he said, ‘I think she knew I was in love with her, long before I knew it myself. Call it the foolishness of a middle-aged man, but there was something about her I was drawn to.’
‘Barry, you said you went into the kitchen to make cocoa. What happened then?’ Kate knew she needed to push him.
‘When I came back, there was only the light of the fire. She had stripped to her underwear. Her breasts were already showing signs of development …’ Again he swallowed hard. ‘She was so beautiful, not a child, but not yet a woman, a body metamorphosing in the most thrilling way.’ He looked from Kate to Lynch, then back to Kate. ‘As I said, I think she knew I loved her long before I did. It took all my strength to resist, with her standing like some mythical vision by the fire and the flames dancing off the wall.’
‘So what stopped you?’ Kate asked.
‘She was still a child, and undoubtedly a child who had seen her fair share of hurt. When I looked into her eyes, I realised I was being tested, one part of her wanting me to take her, the other part hoping I wouldn’t.’
‘So you passed the test?’ Kate replied.
‘Yes.’ He nodded. Then, standing up, he said, ‘You see, all I could think of was the girl I had come to know, the one who was obsessed with Grimms’ fairy tales, her wanting me to read them over and over in school. That night I told her she was beautiful, which wasn’t a lie.’ He exhaled. ‘I gave her a blanket to wrap around herself, knowing if I forced her to get dressed there and then, it would have heightened her shame. I needed to be careful. She was so fragile …’
‘And then what?’ Kate was relieved that Lynch had decided to leave the questioning to her.
‘She told me about her mother – or, at least, what she had fantasised about her.’
‘What did she tell you?’
‘She said her grandfather had abused her mother, and that after she was born, her grandmother …’
‘Go on,’ Kate pressed.
‘I doubt any of this is true, you understand, but …’
‘What about her grandmother?’
‘Sandra believed her grandmother killed her mother, or at least left her to die, before burning her in the woods.’
Kate kept her voice low: ‘It may be truer than you think, Barry.’
‘She said that when she used to run through the woods she hoped one day she would find her.’