MURDER BY THE HIDDEN BAY: Irish detectives scramble to find a killer (The Galway Homicides Book 13) by David Pearson

Author:David Pearson [Pearson, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Book Folks - bestselling crime fiction
Published: 2022-06-20T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eighteen

When Lyons had set things in motion in Roundstone, she set off for Clifden. The drive up past Dog’s Bay and on out towards Murvey and Ballyconneely was very picturesque. Lyons always enjoyed this drive, even when the sun wasn’t shining. There was something special about the air all along the Atlantic coast, so she lowered the windows to let the freshness circulate all around. As she passed the various dilapidated properties on the sea side of the road, her mind wandered back to the nineteenth century when Ireland was gripped by famine, and people moved to the coast to live off a meagre diet of fish and seaweed. By 1860, the population of the country had been reduced from over eight million twenty years earlier to just over five million by virtue of mass emigration and starvation.

Lyons arrived in Clifden soon after eleven and parked her car outside the Garda station at the start of the main Galway Road. Inside, Sergeant Séan Mulholland was just setting up his mid-morning cup of tea and a saucer of chocolate biscuits that was his any-time-of-day snack.

“Good morning, Maureen. I heard you were on the way out. Would you like a cup of tea?”

“Thanks, Séan, yes, that would be lovely.”

Mulholland fetched another mug and prepared a drink for Lyons. As he placed it on the table, he nudged the saucer of biscuits in her direction, rather hoping she wouldn’t take any.

When the two of them were settled at the table, Mulholland listened intently as Lyons brought him up to date with progress on the Aoife Gilpin murder.

“Do you know Gerald Gilpin at all, Séan?”

“Oh, that one. I do, to be sure. You know he used to be a teacher?”

“Yes, I knew that. It seems he was dismissed for inappropriate behaviour with one of the teenaged girls.”

“And that wasn’t the end of it. After he was let go, he started a business of sorts here in the town and he employed a young one. She only lasted a few weeks, and then she left abruptly. She never made a complaint or anything, but the rumours went around.”

“Did you ever speak to the girl?” Lyons said.

“Ah, you’d see her out and about, but I never spoke to her about what happened with Gilpin. It would have been awkward to raise it with her if she just wanted to forget about it and move on.”

“What did he do for an assistant then?”

“He employed Aoife for a while. But then she left too and went to work in the hotel in Roundstone. I don’t think he has anyone working with him since. Once the word got out, none of the lassies from here would go near him. But what’s all this about tobacco and cigarettes, Maureen?”

“We’re just sorting that out now, Séan. But it looks like there’s some kind of scam going on at the hotel involving the sale of contraband tobacco, and it appears that Aoife Gilpin may have been mixed up in it. But it’s not clear exactly what it’s all about just yet.

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