Orla’s bedside locker: hair straightener, makeup, fake tan, iPod, jewellery box. Phone. No books. I left the door open.
Orla didn’t even notice what I was doing. Her mouth was hanging open. ‘Wasn’t the dog dead?’ she wanted to know.
Conway managed not to roll her eyes. ‘Yeah. It was very dead. The techs had taken it away and all. That’s the point. Detective Moran here, he says to O’Farrell, “You got another dog?” O’Farrell can’t even talk, but he shakes his head.’
Alison’s locker: straightener, makeup, yada yada, no books, no extra phone. Gemma’s locker: same story, plus a bottle of capsules of some herbal thing swearing to make her skinny.
‘We go back to questioning him, but the noise keeps happening. We can’t concentrate, right? Finally Detective Moran gets pissed off. Jumps up, heads for the door. O’Farrell practically comes off his chair, roars at Moran, “Jesus God, don’t open that door!”’
She was good, Conway. The room had changed, dark places stirring, bright ones pulsing. Orla was mesmerised.
‘But it’s too late: Moran’s already opening the door. Far as we can see, me and him, the hall’s empty. Nothing there. Then O’Farrell starts to scream.’
One big wardrobe, all along one side of the room. Inside, it was split into four sections. Tangled bright things spilling out.
‘We look around, O’Farrell’s flying backwards off his chair, grabbing his throat. Howling like he’s being killed. First we think he’s putting it on, right, get out of being questioned? Then we see the blood.’
Breathy whine bursting out of Orla. I tried to check drawers without touching anything girly. Wished Conway was doing this bit. There were Tampax in there.
‘It’s dripping out between his fingers. He’s on the floor, kicking, howling, “Get it off me! Get it off!” Me and Moran, we’re like, What the fuck? We haul him outside – we don’t know what else to do, figure maybe the fresh air’ll help. He stops screaming, but he’s still moaning, holding his throat. We get his hands away. And I swear to God’ – Conway was in close, eyes locked on Orla’s – ‘I’ve seen dog bites. That, on O’Farrell’s throat, that was a dog bite.’
Orla asked faintly, ‘Did he die?’
‘Nah. Few stitches.’
‘The dog was only little,’ I said. Worked around someone’s bras. ‘Couldn’t do too much damage.’
‘After the doctors got him cleaned up,’ Conway said, ‘O’Farrell spilled his guts. Full confession. When we took him off in cuffs, he was still screaming, “Keep it away from me! Don’t let it get me!” Grown man, begging like a kid.’
‘Never made it to trial,’ I said. ‘Wound up in a mental hospital instead. He’s still there.’
Orla said, and it came from the heart, ‘OhmyGod.’
‘So,’ Conway said. ‘When McKenna says there’s no such thing as ghosts, excuse us if we have a laugh.’
Nothing in the wardrobe drawers that didn’t belong there, not on a quick check. Plenty that did; these four could have started their own Abercrombie & Fitch outlet. Nothing in the pockets of the hanging clothes. ‘We’re not saying Alison actually saw Chris Harper’s ghost,’ I said, reassuring. ‘Not for definite.’
‘Jaysus, no,’ Conway agreed. ‘She could’ve imagined the whole thing.’
‘Well,’ I said, poking through shoes. ‘She didn’t imagine that arm.’ Nothing on the wardrobe floor.
‘Nah, not that. I guess that could’ve maybe been allergies or whatever, though; who knows?’ Shrug, unconvinced. ‘All I’m saying is, if I knew anything that had anything to do with Chris, and I kept it to myself, I wouldn’t fancy turning out the lights tonight.’
I dialled the number that had texted me. All the phones stayed dark. No ringing coming from under a bed, from a stack of clothes I’d skimmed over.
‘Hate to admit it,’ I said. Glanced over my shoulder, did a shiver. ‘Me neither.’
Orla’s eyes skimming the room, hitting the corners, the shadows. Real fear.
Conway’s story had hit the mark. And Orla wasn’t the only one she’d been aiming at. The ghost story, or as much of it as Orla could remember, would be round the fourth-years inside half an hour.
‘Speaking of which.’ Conway swept up her satchel, plopped herself down nice and comfy on Joanne’s bed, right on top of her uniform – Orla’s eyes widened, like Conway had done something daring. ‘You might want to take a look at this.’
Orla edged closer. ‘Have a seat,’ Conway said, patting the bed. After a second Orla moved Joanne’s skirt carefully out of the way and sat down.
I swung the wardrobe shut, leaned against it. Got out my notebook. Kept an eye on the door for flickers of shadow moving behind it, out in the hall.
Conway flipped open the satchel, whipped out the evidence bag and smacked it down on Orla’s lap, all before Orla had a chance to work out what was going on. Said, ‘You’ve seen this before.’
Orla took one look at the Thérèse book and bit down on both lips, hard. Hiss of in-breath through her nose.
Conway said, ‘Do us a favour. Don’t try to tell us you don’t know what’s in there.’
Orla tried to shake her head and shrug and look innocent, all at once. It came out like some kind of spasm.
‘Orla. Pay attention. I’m not asking you if this was yours. I’m telling you we already know. You try to lie about it, all that’ll happen is you’ll get us pissed off and you’ll get Chris pissed off. You want to do that?’
Trapped between thick and terrified, Orla dived for the only way out she could see. ‘It’s Joanne’s!’
‘What is?’
‘The key. That was Joanne’s. It wasn’t mine.’
And bingo. Straight in there, our Orla, dobbing her mates in as quick as she could. The flare of Conway’s nose said she smelled it too. ‘Same difference. Yous robbed it out of the nurse’s office.’
‘No! Swear to God, we never stole anything.’
‘Then how’d you get it? You telling me the nurse gave it to you ’cause she couldn’t resist your pretty faces?’
Orla’s face lit up with that thin malice. ‘Julia Harte had it. Probably she stole it, or one of them did. We got a copy off her – Joanne got it, I mean. Not me.’
Not bingo. All eight of them in the frame for the card, now all eight in the frame for eyewitnesses. And all eight in the frame, opportunity clicking into place, for the killer.
Conway’s eyebrow was up. ‘Right. Joanne asked nicely, Julia said, “No problem, anything for you, darling.” Yeah? ’Cause you’re all best buddies?’
Orla shrugged. ‘I mean, I don’t know. I wasn’t there.’
I hadn’t been there either, but I knew. Blackmail: Joanne had spotted Julia on her way in or out, Share or we tell.
‘When was that?’
‘Like, forever ago.’
‘When’s forever?’
‘After Christmas – last Christmas. I haven’t even, ohmyGod, thought about it all year?’
‘How many times did you use it?’
Orla remembered she could get in trouble here. ‘I didn’t. I swear. I totally swear.’
‘You gonna keep swearing when we find your prints all over it?’
‘I got it out a few times, or put it back. But for Joanne, and Gemma. Not for me.’
‘You never snuck out? Not once?’