I’m not the only reporter at the police station. I didn’t expect to be. There are representatives here from other newspapers, from the radio and from the TV. They are huddled together when I arrive, no doubt talking through what each of them has heard so far. I don’t think it’s a figment of my imagination that they appear to stop talking as soon as I arrive. They look flustered.

‘Ingrid,’ Aidan Devine from the BBC says. ‘Nice to see you. We didn’t know if you would make it or not. This is mad, isn’t it?’

‘Why didn’t you think I would be here?’ I ask, bristling at the question.

I can see some of the other reporters look down to their feet, desperate not to catch my eye.

‘Well,’ Aidan says, ‘I heard you were in a bit of trouble yourself last night. Your car? And that incident at your apartment block? Do you think it might be linked to all this?’

I shrug. ‘I suppose the police will tell us that,’ I say coldly. ‘But if you’re asking in some sort of roundabout way if I’m responsible for what has happened to Liam Doherty, then no. I’m not. I just told their story. That’s all. Any of you would have given your eye teeth for that story, too.’

‘You’ve been talking to Jamesy Harte, from what I hear,’ Nuala McLaughlin from one of our rival papers says as she pushes a stick of chewing gum into her mouth.

For as long as I’ve known Nuala, she has been trying to quit smoking, and hiding the telltale smell of cigarette smoke on her breath with Wrigley’s Spearmint.

‘That has nothing to do with anything,’ I say.

‘I think Liam Doherty might say differently,’ Nuala says.

She says it in a manner to sound like jokey banter, but I know there’s a sting in her tail.

‘The Doherty family have no problem with me,’ I say, and am extremely grateful to see the doors open to the police station and the police press officer, Sue Clarke, walk out ahead of DI Bradley and DS King.

Their expressions are set, serious and sombre. Sue Clarke thanks us all for coming out, especially on such a cold day. We nod and say it’s not a problem, even if it is. She hands out paper copies of the statement and if I’m not mistaken, she gives me a sympathetic look. I imagine she knows exactly how I’m caught up in all this mess. I’m sure I’m the talk of the station by now.