The priest shook his head. ‘I’m sorry. The fact that an individual may be deceased does not alter a priest’s obligation to honour the seal of the confessional. But I don’t know anything that might be of help. And if I did, I couldn’t tell you.’

‘I don’t know if you understand what we are dealing with here, Monsignor.’ Swallow’s tone hardened just a little. ‘We have a young girl murdered in the most savage way. We have no witnesses, no significant clues, no motive. Whoever did this could strike again on another innocent victim. It’s essential that we find out anything in Alice’s background or life that could shed light on why this happened.’

Feehan snapped back. ‘If the police were more energetic in protecting the citizens of Dublin instead of helping to evict people from their farms perhaps this monster would have been apprehended on the spot. Were there no policemen on duty last night?’

Swallow’s irritation was rising. He steadied himself to reply. He would be courteous to a fault when the police were being denigrated or provoked. ‘The Dublin Metropolitan Police are not engaged in any evictions, Monsignor. Our task is to prevent crime in this city, and if we cannot always succeed in that then it is to make criminals amenable to the law. But without assistance I am left hunting for a needle in a haystack.’

‘Then hunt you must, Mr Swallow. And I sincerely hope that you’re good at it.’

Mossop looked up from his notes. ‘If I could make an observation, sir, perhaps you’d comment on it. It seemed to me that Mrs Flannery is very well-spoken, very articulate for a woman in her financial circumstances.’

Feehan permitted himself a thin smile. ‘Your observation is astute, Sergeant. One might say that Bridget Flannery married somewhat beneath her. Her people owned a small shop, groceries, that kind of thing, in the village of Ranelagh. She had a good education if not an extended one with the Loreto sisters on St Stephen’s Green. Her late husband, John or Jack, was a labouring man without education or a trade. You probably know that he died tragically some years ago. An accident at the docks.’

‘Might she not then have secured better employment than cleaning in the church?’ Mossop followed up.

The priest shrugged. ‘That is not for me to say. Tending to the house of God is not menial. She has proven very suitable to the parish. As did her daughter. And as you know, Alice continued to develop her work in the restaurant trade, as I understand it.’

‘What can you tell us about the rest of the family?’ Mossop asked. ‘There are brothers and sisters. It was her younger brother, Daniel, who reported her missing last night.’