63

Gerry Fegan didn’t slow his pace as he approached Marie McKenna’s flat on Eglantine Avenue. A female cop leaned on a patrol car eating chips from a polystyrene tray. A bottle of Coca-Cola sat on the car roof. Another cop emerged from the house. He threw a stuffed bin liner onto the car’s back seat and closed the door. He tried to filch a chip from the woman cop’s tray. She pulled it away, but not before he snagged a few. He grinned at her as he chewed them.

Fegan was less than twenty yards away, on the other side of the avenue, when a young man came out of the house. He looked like a student. He exchanged a few words with the cops before heading towards the Malone Road, walking in the same direction as Fegan. Going to the university, or maybe the Student Union building.

Fegan lifted his pace to match the boy’s. The cops were too busy arguing over their chips to notice him. What had happened there? The cop he’d talked to on the phone said Marie and Ellen were safe, and Fegan believed him. But for how long? If someone had tried to harm them, then they would try again. He quickened his steps to close the distance between him and the boy. By the time they reached the corner of Eglantine Avenue and the Malone Road, Fegan was just steps behind him.

‘What was all that about?’ Fegan called, his voice light and friendly.

The boy slowed and looked back. ‘What?’

‘Back there,’ Fegan said as he drew level with the boy. ‘The cops outside that house you came out of. Was there trouble?’

Unease creased the boy’s forehead. He looked around him. The Malone Road teemed with life. Fegan kept his hands in his pockets, his voice friendly. He tried a smile. ‘Just curious,’ he said.

The boy kept walking. ‘The woman who used to live there,’ he said, ‘she had some trouble yesterday. Something at the hospital.’

‘What sort of trouble?’ Fegan asked, keeping in step with him.

‘I only heard what was on the news,’ the boy said. ‘Someone tried to snatch her daughter. Then the police came today to get some of her stuff.’

‘Are they all right? The little girl, is she okay?’

‘Far as I know.’

‘Did they say where she is now?’

‘No.’

‘Is she with that cop?’

The boy stopped. He looked north towards the university, then back along the Malone Road. ‘What cop? Listen, who are you?’

Fegan’s cheeks grew hot. ‘No one. I was having something to eat in the café at the other end of the road. The waitress said there’d been trouble. I was just curious.’

The boy started walking, but kept his gaze on Fegan. ‘I don’t know where she is. It’s nothing to do with me. Look, why don’t you ask those cops? I need to go. I’m late for class.’

Fegan watched the boy walk away, caution and desperation fighting within him. He followed. ‘Were they hurt?’

The boy quickened his pace. ‘I don’t know. I don’t think so. Look, I really need to go.’

‘What about—’

‘I told you, I don’t know anything about it.’

Fegan slowed, let the boy leave him behind. ‘Thanks,’ he called after him.

The boy looked over his shoulder once, but said nothing. He broke into a run when he reached the traffic lights at the end of the road.