One year later, on 2 November, Peter Mulvey was charged with the rape and murder of Elizabeth Cullen. Shortly after I’d handed the bag into the Garda station, Gardai had tracked down Alf Meehan in his new home and questioned him. He said that the bag did not belong to him and that Peter Mulvey had once asked him to burn it. Alf Meehan had suffered from a fear of fire all his life, and so, rather than burning it, he had buried it in his back garden, along with all his other unwanted rubbish. Before he buried it, he took the money out of it, but was not interested in the library card, or the violin strings, or the hat, or the lipstick.
When he heard of Beth Cullen’s disappearance he had his suspicions. But he never said anything. Alf was a simple man, whom Peter Mulvey had a tight control over. Peter Mulvey was the only person who knew that it was Alf who had once stolen £25 from the church offertory. Peter was on a business trip when he heard that Alf was moving house. He sent him a threatening letter, just to make sure he didn’t say a word to anyone.
There was much speculation regarding the exact events of the day that Beth Cullen went missing. The night I handed in the bag I had a dream. In that dream I saw exactly what had happened.
On the evening of 21 December 1986 Beth Cullen was cycling home from Carrick-on-Shannon. That day she had bought Christmas presents for her parents and younger brother and sister and a packet of violin strings. She was about twenty minutes from her house in Avarna when Peter Mulvey pulled up beside her and asked her if she wanted a lift. Beth knew Peter well, from the ceili band and from the church choir, and it had just started to rain, so she accepted his offer. He put down the back seats and lifted her black bicycle into the boot. Beth sat in the passenger seat with her shopping bags and her brown leather handbag. A few minutes later Peter took a left turn off the main road that led them on to a much narrower one.
‘I just have to drop something off to a man up here. Is that OK?’ he said. Beth nodded.
‘All set for Christmas?’ asked Peter, his eyes glancing over at Beth as he spoke. She was wearing a blue dress that rested just above her knees.
‘Almost,’ she said with a smile.
The left front tyre hit a pothole hard.
‘I better check that,’ said Peter. He swerved into the right, to an opening in the forest and stopped abruptly. He got out of the car to examine the damaged tyre. Beth recognized where she was – they were parked near the mines, only ten minutes from her house. She opened the car door.
‘It’s stopped raining now,’ she said. ‘Mam will have the dinner ready. I could just cycle from here.’
Peter Mulvey stood up straight. And that’s when she noticed his eyes. There was something strange about them. Something not right. He grabbed her arm and pulled her towards him. She screamed and kicked and desperately tried to pull away, but was helpless against Peter’s brutal strength. He dragged her into the trees, pushed her to the ground and climbed on top of her.
‘Get off me!’ she screamed. ‘Stop it! Get off me!’
All the time he looked straight at her, looked right into her eyes with his own manic stare. She stopped screaming. He didn’t like that. He wrapped his hands round her neck, and didn’t let go until she couldn’t breathe any more. He carried her body further into the forest and set it down on a carpet of twigs. Then he went back to his car, drove up near the church and dumped the black bicycle and the paper bags in the ditch. He ought to have gone home then. But he didn’t. He drove back to the forest. He wanted to see her again. He wanted to see her face, feel her skin, kiss her lips. So he did.
As he drove back down the road, he noticed something under the passenger seat. A brown leather handbag. He had to get rid of it. He couldn’t throw it out the window. He was too near the village. What if somebody saw him? He couldn’t go back up to the mines. What if somebody was there? People might already be out searching for her. He knew who would take care of it. He swerved into Alf Meehan’s driveway and ordered him to burn the bag.
I never dreamed about Beth Cullen again.
The search for Beth Cullen began on 21 December when her parents started to worry. They rang Des, who told them he hadn’t heard from her since that afternoon. The bike and the shopping bags were found the next day but the body wasn’t discovered until the 28th, one week after she was murdered. The body had been well preserved due to the very cold conditions. It had so many bruises. That’s what Lily Cullen would always remember. So many bruises.
For twenty-five years Sergeant Michael Reynolds made Des Butler’s life a living hell. Convinced that he had killed Beth, he dragged his name through the dirt, so that Des often found it difficult to get work close to home. He had no alibi for the night of 21 December so many people believed him to be guilty.
Following the discovery of Beth Cullen’s body, blood samples were taken from approximately one hundred men living in Avarna and its surrounding areas. The blood samples, as well as the semen found on Beth’s body, were preserved. Having been given new evidence in the form of the bag and its contents, after hearing my story and interviewing Alf Meehan, the Gardai decided to reopen the case. That day Sergeant Michael Reynolds requested a transfer from Avarna. He couldn’t face the embarrassment that the man he had accused so publicly was actually innocent. He told Mary, Nick and Rosie that they were moving house. Mary refused to go. She stayed with her children in Avarna.
Why did Beth Cullen wait twenty-five years to get in touch? Because she wanted to wait until her father had passed on. She knew that if Jim found out that Peter Mulvey had killed her, he would have tried to kill Peter himself. So she waited until he had died, then she chose somebody to contact. She chose me.
I never received any official recognition from the Gardai. I didn’t want it. I’d told them about my special ability, but I didn’t want to publicize it. And I guess they didn’t want it known publicly that crimes were being solved by fifteen-year-old girls who could communicate with spirits. I didn’t hear from them again. Not until last night.