“Will you be at the funeral Dr Lasseter?” asked Lafferty.
Sarah shook her head and replied, “No Father. It’s against unit policy.” Then realising how cold and impersonal that sounded, she added, “There are just so many.”
Lafferty nodded and said quietly, “Of course. How thoughtless of me.”
“No, not at all!” said Sarah, suddenly anxious to assure Lafferty.
For some reason the last thing in the world she wanted to do was offend this man. Perhaps it was because he had been so kind to her when she had felt vulnerable or perhaps it was because she detected a kind of vulnerability in him. She didn’t know but suddenly knew that she had to confide in someone and Lafferty was the man. “I was wondering if I might have a word with you, Father,” she said.
“Of course,” said Lafferty automatically before starting to wonder why? “Just now?”
“No, I’d rather it was somewhere away from here,” said Sarah, looking over her shoulder.
“Perhaps you could come to St Xavier’s? I live in the house next door,” suggested Lafferty. “Or...”
“That would be fine.”
“This evening?”
“Ideal, I have the evening off.”
“Shall we say, seven o’clock?”
A nurse came into the room and Sarah’s voice changed. “Yes, Father Lafferty, that would be perfectly all right,” she said in official tones.
She led the way out of the room.
Lafferty answered the door when Sarah arrived at two minutes past seven. He had changed out of clerical gear and was wearing navy blue cord trousers and a matching polo shirt. Sarah was ushered into a comfortable, if old fashioned, room which had not seen a change of furniture in a very long time.
“Tea? Coffee? A drink?” inquired Lafferty when he had closed the door and the pleasantries were over.
Sarah, who was sitting awkwardly on the edge of a faded green sofa, hesitated for a moment before saying, “If a drink is really on offer I’d love one.”
“Whisky, gin or sherry? That’s your choice,” smiled Lafferty.
“Gin please.”
Lafferty opened up his drinks cabinet and extracted a bottle of Beefeater Gin. He continued with a rummage through the bottles before saying, “It will have to be bitter lemon, I’m afraid. I don’t seem to have any tonic.”
“Fine,” said Sarah.
Lafferty poured himself a large Jamieson’s whiskey and sat down opposite her.
“Irish whiskey?” said Sarah.
“A tribute to my roots. With a name like Lafferty and a job like mine what did you expect?”
“You don’t sound Irish.”
“My parents left Ireland when I was seven. I was brought up in Liverpool.”
“So you are one of these people with divided loyalties at rugby internationals?” smiled Sarah.
“No problem. I wear the green.”
Sarah nodded and took a sip of her drink.
“How can I help you, Doctor?” asked Lafferty, seeing the troubled look appear in her eyes.
“Call me Sarah.”
“Very well, Sarah.”
Sarah opened her mouth to start speaking but then she stopped and shook her head. “Maybe I should have gone to the police but they wouldn’t believe me.”
“The police?” asked Lafferty.
Sarah nodded. “I think a crime has been committed.”
“At the hospital?”
“Yes.”
“What sort of crime?”
“Murder.”
Lafferty’s mouth fell open.
“Murder?” he exclaimed. “But who?”
“One of the patients in HTU, John McKirrop. I’m convinced he was murdered.”
Lafferty took a few moments to get over the second shock — hearing the name, McKirrop. He composed himself before saying calmly, “Have I got this right? You are telling me that John McKirrop was murdered while in hospital?”
“I think so,” said Sarah. “In fact, I’m sure of it.”
“But why? How?”
“I don’t know why but I do know how,” said Sarah. She told Lafferty about her examination of the cadaver and the evidence she had found.
“You’re absolutely certain about this?”
Sarah nodded. “The trouble is, that I can’t prove it without the original skull X-ray. Without that, everything seems to be above board. Mr McKirrop was admitted to HTU with a depressed fracture of the skull and it caused massive brain damage. End of story. Only I and the killer know that the fracture got much worse after he was admitted to HTU.”
Lafferty shook his head, finding it difficult to take everything in. “But why?” he asked. “Who would want to kill a man like John McKirrop?”
“Needless to say, I’ve been thinking about that a lot,” said Sarah. “The only thing I can come up with concerns a colleague, Dr Derek Logan. He’s actually my immediate boss.”
Sarah told Lafferty about Logan being made to look foolish if McKirrop had recovered from his injuries. “He dismissed the patient as being a hopeless case without even checking the X-rays.”
“I see,” said Lafferty thoughtfully. “As an outsider, it all seems a bit extreme to say the least. Do you really think this man Logan capable of such an act?”
Sarah sighed and shook her head. “Much as I dislike him, no I don’t,” she said. “It’s more a case of being unable to think of any other motive.”
“Then we’ll have to look for one,” said Lafferty.
“I’ve been trying,” said Sarah with a wry smile.
“Have you managed to come up with anything at all?”
“I suppose it’s just possible that McKirrop knew something that other people didn’t want him to talk about,” said Sarah.
“That makes sense,” agreed Lafferty. “Any idea about what it could be?”
Sarah looked doubtful. She paused before saying, “This may sound silly but I think it could be something to do with the satanists and what happened in the cemetery with the Main boy.”
Lafferty heart missed a beat. “What makes you say that?” he asked, taking a sip of his drink.
“I saw John McKirrop the first time he was admitted to hospital, just after he had been beaten up by the men in the cemetery. There was something about him; it’s hard to put my finger on it exactly but I got the distinct impression he knew more than he ever said about the affair.”
“Why do you say that?”
“At first he wouldn’t speak about what happened at all. He seemed scared. I had to urge him to tell the police what he knew for the sake of the boy’s father. Apparently he did do that but I remember thinking at the time that he wanted to tell me something else. It was as if he...”
“Hadn’t been telling the whole story?” added Lafferty.
“Exactly. How did you know I was going to say that?”
“I’ve been uneasy about what happened in the cemetery myself,” said Lafferty. “I’ve read every book on the occult I can lay my hands on, I’ve talked to an expert on the black arts and still nothing has emerged to suggest what kind of group would want the body or why. That’s why I wanted to talk to McKirrop if he came round. I wanted to know if there had been something else he hadn’t been telling us. Some extra clue.”
“I see,” said Sarah.
“There’s something else that’s bothering me. You told me that McKirrop had used the word, ‘yobs’ when referring to the men who had dug up the Main boy. John Main used the same word when he called me up this morning to tell me that he had found the men who did it. From what he said, they didn’t sound like Black Mass material. It made me more certain than ever that McKirrop didn’t tell the whole truth—”
“Did you say that Mr Main had found the men?” interrupted Sarah.
Lafferty nodded and told her briefly how Main had done it. “The police are looking for them now.”