Plane Dead: A mile-high murder puzzles Irish detectives (The Dublin Homicides Book 5), page 1
PLANE DEAD
A mile-high murder puzzles Irish detectives
DAVID PEARSON
Published by
THE BOOK FOLKS
London, 2021
© David Pearson
Polite note to the reader
This book is written in British English except where fidelity to other languages or accents is appropriate.
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We hope you enjoy the book.
PLANE DEAD is the fifth standalone mystery in a gripping series by bestselling author David Pearson. Details about the other books, and a lists of characters, can be found at the end of this one.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Epilogue
Character List
Other books in this series
More fiction by David Pearson
Other titles of interest
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Chapter One
The European Airways flight from London’s Gatwick airport to Dublin boarded without incident. It was a Friday night, just coming up to eight o’clock, with the plane due to take off at ten past the hour. All 189 seats had been sold, as was customary for this particular journey. The passengers comprised those who worked in the UK during the week and travelled home at the weekends, or were returning from a day trip to London; others who were going to Dublin just for the weekend to enjoy the ‘craic’, and a couple of specialist parties of ‘hens’ and ‘stags’ who had chosen the fleshpots of Temple Bar for their weekend revelry.
The mood was boisterous among many of the passengers, and the four cabin attendants – all female on this occasion – were in for a very busy time, especially as the pilot had told them that the flight time would be just 55 minutes.
At five past eight, with all 189 passengers boarded, the cabin crew closed the doors of the Boeing 737, and armed the slides as they always did before each exit was cross-checked. The pilot was informed that the cabin was secure, and the aircraft pushed back from the stand and the engines were started.
The weather on route was good, despite a little gentle turbulence as they climbed out of the southern British airport, and the atmosphere on board was lively as the stewardesses made their way slowly along the aisle serving significant quantities of alcohol to the passengers, the hen and stag parties being particularly keen to start their festivities as soon as possible.
On the flight deck, things were going smoothly. Captain Piotr Kaan, ably assisted by his Swedish co-pilot Andrea Bergin, was progressing the flight easily and steadily at 37,000 feet, crossing the Welsh border near Hereford and tracking toward Anglesey. When they reached Holyhead, they turned their machine to the west and pointed it directly at Dublin, where they would land on runway 28 into the gentle breeze.
The captain alerted the cabin staff that there was ten minutes to landing, and the drinks trollies were hastily put away while another member of the team passed through the cabin collecting empties and other rubbish in a plastic refuse sack. On this occasion, the crew had no time to sell scratch cards or reduced-price cosmetics, so heavy the demand had been for drinks on the flight.
* * *
“European 995 descend to 5,000 feet and cleared visual-ILS approach to runway 28. Wind is 260 at five knots gusting eight,” the Dublin controller said.
“Roger, European 995. Down to 5,000 and cleared ILS for two-eight. Call you established.”
The 737 had already captured the ILS beam that would navigate the aircraft to the threshold of the runway, although on this fine evening the flight crew didn’t need its assistance. As they manoeuvred around Howth Head, they could see the strip of bright lights that was their target, coming into view.
“Landing checklist,” Piotr said to Andrea who was the Pilot Flying for this leg of the journey.
“Gear down,” Andrea said.
“Affirm – three greens.”
“Go round alt set.”
“Three thousand feet, check.”
“Spoilers armed.”
“Check.”
“Autobrakes.”
“Set to medium.”
“Landing lights.”
“On.”
“Cabin secure, seat belt signs on.”
“Check.”
And when the aircraft reached 200 feet on its final approach, Piotr called out, “Minimums.”
“Landing,” the co-pilot responded.
As the plane glided over the threshold, Andrea closed the throttles and lifted the nose gently, allowing the big machine to flare and sink easily onto the tarmac with a puff of blue smoke from the tyres just at the touchdown point. She then rolled the reverse thrust levers up while Piotr deployed the spoilers and the machine slowly shed its momentum.
“60 knots,” called Piotr and then the radio crackled into life again.
“European 995. On at 21:04. Next convenient right turn, and contact ground on 121.8.”
“Next right and ground 121.8. Thanks. Bye,” Piotr said into his headset.
The captain selected the second radio set which had already been programmed to the required frequency.
“European 995 with you,” Piotr said.
“European 995, good evening. Follow the Bravos. Hold short of the apron. There’s a company 737 just pushing back on stand 138.”
“Roger, follow the Bravos and hold short for stand 138, European 995.”
When the plane stopped at the end of the taxiway as directed, several passengers jumped up to retrieve their cases from the overhead lockers, anxious to get off and start partying for real. One of the flight attendants walked briskly down the aisle asking them to retake their seats and observe the ‘Fasten Seat Belt’ sign until they reached the gate and the captain had turned it off, while another one of the crew made an announcement to the same effect over the public address system.
After a few minutes, the departing plane was out of the way, and Andrea continued the last part of the journey, docking at stand 138 as directed, and shutting down the engines.
“Nice landing, Andrea, very smooth,” Piotr said as they both completed the after-landing checklist.
“Thanks, skipper. Who’s flying back to Gatwick?”
“I’ll do that. There shouldn’t be too much traffic at this hour. What’s the booked load anyway?”
“Guess.”
“Don’t tell me – 189. How do they do it?” Piotr said.
“Not quite. Just 173 tonight. But there’s no hurry. We’re not due out till 9:55. We made good time coming across.”
* * *
The senior flight attendant deployed the built-in steps at the front of the cabin, while a portable stairway was attached to the rear of the plane and the passengers slowly began to disembark. Eventually, the cabin was empty, or so they thought. But Marta, the senior cabin attendant, thought she could see a man’s head protruding slightly from a window seat in row 14, so she went down along the aisle to see what was going on. Most likely, she thought, he’d fallen asleep after a few drinks. It happened quite often.
When she reached row 14, she found a man with short, mousy brown hair in a similarly coloured brown suit and a green shirt and tie slumped against the wall of the cabin. Marta leaned in across the two empty seats, and gently shook him by the shoulder.
“Sir. Sir, wake up. We are in Dublin.”
There was no response, so she shook him a little bit harder, and spoke more loudly.
“Wake up, sir. We have reached our destination.”
But he didn’t stir.
Marta instinctively felt that there was something amiss. She had woken many passengers from a drunken slumber in her years of flying, but this was different. The man’s body was limp, offering no resistance to her pushing on his upper arm and shoulder. She also noticed that there was a white substance – almost like the froth that you get when you take your first sip of beer from a g
Marta went back up to the front of the plane and summoned Captain Kaan from the flight deck.
“Captain, could you come please. We have a passenger in 14F who isn’t moving, and I don’t think he’s asleep.”
“Hmm… OK. Let me see.”
Piotr Kaan sidestepped down along the aisle of the plane, following Marta’s lead, till they arrived at row 14. He leaned in and placed his first two fingers against the man’s neck, but could feel no pulse. The man’s skin was cool and clammy too, and he had started to go an unusual blue colour around the face.
As he stood up again, he said to Marta, “I’m sorry, Marta, I think this man is actually dead.”
Marta’s hand flew to her face, and she started to weep as she said, “Oh my God. My God.”
Kaan took Marta’s arm and helped her back to the front of the plane where a European Airways despatcher in a high-vis jacket was talking to Andrea Bergin. Kaan sat Marta down and explained the situation to her colleague. He then addressed the despatcher and told him of their dilemma.
“Jesus! Are you serious, skipper? God, I’ve never had anything like this before. I’d better get the duty manager. You all better stay on board for now,” the man said.
“Yes, please. And you will have to get another aircraft and crew for the return flight to Gatwick. We won’t be doing it,” Kaan said.
“Oh, right. Yes, of course.” And with that he descended the steps again and disappeared into the building.
Chapter Two
By the time Detective Inspector Aidan Burke got to the steps of the aircraft, several other Gardaí had arrived on the scene, and the aircraft had been surrounded by blue and white plastic tape to create a kind of makeshift cordon. A Garda at the foot of the stairs took Burke’s name and wrote it on his clipboard, examining the senior officer’s warrant card as he did so.
Burke was separated from his wife. He had married at the age of twenty-six, but by the time he reached forty, his wife, Deirdre, had become completely fed up with his constant absence and heavy drinking, and she had kicked him out. Deirdre had retained the family home in the fashionable suburbs of Knocklyon, while he just managed to keep a second mortgage going on the house in Crumlin which he had bought cheaply for himself, in poor repair. Latterly, thanks to the influence of his sergeant, Fiona Moore, he had managed to curtail his excessive use of alcohol. She had also helped him to get his house tidied up a bit, and he was no longer living in squalor. Moore had no romantic attachment to her boss, but she had a kindness in her that urged her to help a colleague who was obviously in some distress, and so far, it had worked well.
Inside the plane, crouched over the man in row 14, dressed in a white scene-of-crime suit, a woman, whom Burke assumed to be the assistant state pathologist, was probing her client gently with a long swab, collecting saliva and the frothy residue from around the man’s mouth.
“Evening, Aileen,” Burke said, having confirmed the identity of the woman to his own satisfaction.
Aileen Brophy stood back and turned to address Burke, whom she met regularly at the scene of some very unpleasant crimes, often involving fatalities.
“Evening, Aidan. Unusual one. Just getting started on this fellow,” she said.
“What’s the story?”
“By that I presume you mean what was the cause of death, and when did it occur. Patience, dear man. I’ve only just got here.”
“Yes, but if he died of natural causes, say a heart attack, then we can all go home and I can get back to my boxed set of CSI Miami on my DVD player.”
“You should be so lucky. Oh, yes, his heart certainly stopped beating, but then that’s true in one hundred percent of human deaths, as you know. But why? He looks like a perfectly healthy man in his forties. Not overweight. Fit enough. No excess of alcohol from what I can tell. And a suspicious substance around his lips and in his mouth. If I were a guessing girl, I’d say he was most likely poisoned – but of course that’s not an official opinion. You’ll have to wait till we get him back to the morgue and do his bloods and toxicology for that. And that won’t be till tomorrow. Sorry.”
“Do we know who he is?”
“Yes. The cabin crew were able to identify him from his seat number. They think he’s a Jim Farrelly, but I haven’t looked for a wallet or anything. That’s your job.”
“OK. Thanks. How much longer will you be before we can move him?” Burke said.
“Just a few minutes. Is the van here yet?”
“Yes, I think so. It will take a good bit of pushing and pulling to get him out. I’d better send the crew inside with a couple of the Airport Police before we start that. They’ve had enough of a shock already.”
“Do you mind if I have a look in his jacket pocket for a wallet before you remove him?” Burke said.
“Go ahead – fill your boots.”
Burke donned vinyl gloves and gently felt inside the deceased’s jacket, removing a wallet. He opened it and saw the man’s driving licence displayed behind a clear plastic window, suggesting that he was indeed Jim Farrelly. Further exploration revealed a small stack of business cards informing Burke that he worked for a firm of solicitors with offices in Dublin, London, Paris, Frankfurt and New York. There were two Visa debit cards and a mixture of euro and sterling notes tucked in at the back as well.
* * *
Burke instructed one of the Airport Police officers to take the two pilots and four cabin crew inside and keep them in a private room until he could get a chance to come in and speak to them. He then went looking for someone from the airline, and found a rather distressed despatcher hovering in the cockpit not quite knowing what to do.
Burke introduced himself to the young man.
“I need you to find out who was sitting in the seat beside the man who died. In fact, I could do with the whole passenger list sorted by seat number if you could manage it.”
“Yes, I can get that. I’ll need to go into the office, but it won’t take long.”
“Thanks. And this aircraft will have to stay here just as it is until at least tomorrow. It may be a crime scene, so it will need to be carefully examined,” Burke said.
“Can we take the baggage off?” the despatcher said.
“Yes, I don’t see why not. But don’t remove any of the catering or the rubbish from the plane. We’ll need to examine the whole lot.”
The despatcher looked a bit puzzled at this, but didn’t argue.
“OK. I’ll tell the ground crew. I’ll go and get you that list then,” he said. He was relieved to have something to occupy himself.
As Burke made his way across the apron to the terminal building, he called his sergeant.
“Is that you, Fiona?” Burke said.
“Yes, hello, boss. What’s up?”
Detective Sergeant Fiona Moore was a keen young detective sergeant that Burke had spotted languishing in Pearse Street Garda station under the thumb of a lazy detective inspector who never gave her a chance. Burke had managed to get her a transfer to Store Street, and Moore’s talents had blossomed under the proper guidance of the senior man. She had been instrumental in helping Burke put an end to a nasty gang that were using poorly paid port workers to smuggle narcotics into the country.
“Good evening, Fiona. I’m out at the airport. There’s been a dead body found on an incoming flight from London. I need you out here to help conduct some interviews with the crew. I need Amy as well. We need to separate them to make sure their stories are consistent.”
“Oh, OK. I’ll get on it straight away. Meet you at the Airport Garda station?”
“Yep, fine.”
In the summer months, the Airport Garda station was constantly short-handed. In any case, they were used to dealing with much more minor cases, such as a bit of roughhouse on an incoming flight, or theft from passengers’ baggage. Sudden unexplained death was well above their pay grade, so they called on the City Centre Gardaí in these, very unusual, situations.
Inside the terminal Burke found the room where the European Airways crew were waiting, and he split the group up. He divided the four cabin crew into two pairs, and separated the flight crew, finding them adjoining small rooms, and asked them to be patient.
Piotr Kaan spoke up.
“It’s no problem, Inspector. We’re not going anywhere in any case.”
