‘No, wait. I can tell ye this,’ Carmody wagged a finger. ‘It’s comin’ back. There was bobbies. Two o’ them. Two big fellas. They picked me up at Sackville Street, took me to the station for a bit and then they marched me to the North Wall to the boat. I remember that. I remember tellin’ them I had a brother in Liverpool and I had the fare in me pocket. He’s workin’ on the docks there. Got a missus and a child, he has. I kipped in wi’ them for a few days, but the missus didn’t want me aroun’ and I had to go. The brother loaned me the cash to get on through England to come here.’

If it was true that Carmody had been in police custody, even briefly, before leaving Dublin, there was nothing in the DCR file about it, Swallow knew. But that would not necessarily be surprising. Beat men were notoriously careless about paperwork. And what Carmody had described was commonplace in the C-Division around the docks. Young country men, bound for England and hoping to find employment there, frequently fell victim to drink, or the ladies of ‘Monto’, or both, as they tried to make their way to the steam-packet wharf on the North Wall. If they came to the attention of the police, the simple solution was often to assist them on their way.

‘So why come all the way here?’ Swallow asked. ‘Why not just move down to Birmingham or Manchester or even London? You’d have found work somewhere.’

Carmody shrugged.

‘I’ve got a bit of a wanderin’ spirit, Mr Swalla’. I started off for Manchester, sure enough. There’s a lotta Irish there too and work in the fact’ries, they say. But I met a German fella on the train. A waiter, he was. He told me there was plenty o’ jobs here in Berlin and that speakin’ English would be okay. I told him I was workin’ in a restaurant in Dublin, an’ he said that was what they’d like to hear in Berlin. So I just kept goin’. I’d be lyin’ if I told you I paid me fares on the trains to get here. But it’s easy enough to dodge the ticket collectors.’

‘Okay, so tell me about Alice Flannery.’ Swallow softened his tone. ‘What kind of girl was she? Who’d want to harm her?’

Carmody smiled weakly.

‘You’re after givin’ me a fair shock tellin’ me she’s dead, ye know. Ah, she’s . . . was . . . a lovely girl. Right, she didn’t like me and I wasn’t gettin’ anywhere with her. She was all right. Just a bit full of airs and graces, thinkin’ she was better ’n the rest of us workin’ there.’

‘Did she have any falling out with anyone? Any difficulties?’