Unti Lucy Black Novel #3 by Brian McGilloway Page A

“Sorry.”
    â€œYour CDs are arranged alphabetically,” she observed. “I just wondered.”
    â€œThe artists are alphabetical,” Heaney corrected her. “The CDs are chronological, from date of release, within each artist.”
    â€œThat’s . . . impressive,” Lucy managed.
    Heaney blushed. “They thought I was on the spectrum when I was at school.”
    â€œDid they now?” Lucy asked, attempting to appear surprised.
    T HEY DROVE DOWN Great James Street to get a sense of the whereabouts of any CCTV cameras that might have picked up the car. Derry had its own city-­wide CCTV, but it was operated by the City Center Initiative rather than the PSNI. This was, at the time of its installation, the only way to make its presence palatable to the city’s residents, who feared it was another form of police surveillance. The images were monitored by the CCI and, if the police needed to see any images, they had to lodge a request through the Chief Super. The CCI would feed through footage to the Strand Road station and would only provide copies of specific frames from the footage. While the system was working well, it was slow. If they could find a shop nearby whose own external security cameras had picked up the car, it might speed things up a little in identifying the registration number of the vehicle.
    â€œNothing,” Fleming said, glancing at the various building fronts around the alleyway where Heaney had seen the car. There were, as he had said, two large industrial bins against one side of the alley, their lids gaping open. “Best get someone out to seal off the alleyway, so forensics can take a check through it. I’ll put in a request to CCI, too. We know what we’re looking for, so they can go through it themselves and pull an image of the car if they can find one.”
    â€œSpeaking of images, I want to call in with Duffy. The boy claimed he went straight to Belfast. The shop he said he stopped at checked and pulled this picture of a girl who was with him. He was only at the other end of the Glenshane at 4:33. Two and a half hours to make a one-­hour journey.”
    W HEN THEY REACHED Duffy and Sons, Undertakers, a ser­vice was taking place. A family was sitting in the ser­vice room while a vicar led them in prayers. Fleming lowered his head reverentially as they passed the window of the room, while Lucy glanced in, blessing herself instinctively.
    Gabriel Duffy was standing at the back of the room, dressed in the black suit of his trade. He had his head bowed, his hands clasped lightly in front of him, his mouth moving along to the responses of the prayers. He glanced up and acknowledged their presence with an almost imperceptible nod.
    â€œThe boy won’t speak with his father around him,” Lucy said. “I’ll maybe try to get him on his own.”
    At the end of the corridor was a series of doors. One was clearly marked with WC . Of the other two, one was marked PRIVA TE , which Lucy assumed to be an office, and the other bore a sign reading NO ENTRANCE: STAFF ONLY . It was this door that Lucy tried first. The plush carpeting and pine veneer of the corridor and ser­vice room gave way suddenly to a set of concrete steps with a metal handrail. The walls were unpainted, the lights garish and bright after the softened glow of the upper floor. Lucy could hear an echo of dance music coming from below.
    She picked her way down the stairs, which, in turn gave way onto two rooms. The music was coming from the room on the left and it was into this room that she went.
    But for the corpse lying on the covered table at its center, the room could almost have been a dental surgery office. The walls were painted white and lined with white wooden kitchen units. Several metal trays of implements sat on the black worktop. Above the body hung a wide metal showerhead, attached to pipes running the length of the ceiling. The body