‘You are not them,’ he said.

‘What?’

Fannigan’s whiskers twitched.

‘You are not them.’

‘Keep going,’ Arm said.

They walked, Arm following Fannigan in silence, until he decided they were far enough along. He put his hand on Fannigan’s shoulder. The Mule was at its widest point here, maybe fifty feet across, and the noise of the current had become industrially loud.

‘Jacket,’ Arm shouted. Fannigan turned around, took it off and handed it over. Arm balled it and threw it onto the water. It hit the surface and in an instant was snatched away, shedding a curl of froth as it was ferried along for a few moments before sinking into the black.

‘Take off the boots, the rest of your clothes.’

‘What?’

He was beginning to get a grasp of the situation. Arm had invoked the uncles; Fannigan knew what that meant. The uncles, Dympna was right, Arm knew, they’d butcher Fannigan. They’d use him for sport, and take their time doing so. They’d feed his bones to their curs, and sooner or later decide that Dympna’s show of leniency had demonstrated a dangerous weakness at this end of the operation.

Fannigan took his time undressing. The boots he worked off first, then he drew up and off the sweatshirt and the vest beneath.

‘Leave them there,’ Arm said, toeing a spot in the dirt. Fannigan dropped the shirt and vest, and was soon shivering in a way Arm found hard to watch. Fannigan’s torso was pale as milk, his chest hair a scutty fuzz petering down to his navel. His tattoos, in the dark, looked like bruises on his arms.

‘Dympna…’ he said, ‘Dympna said this,’ he touched his bandaged face, ‘Dympna said this was the end of it.’

‘Trousers, c’mon,’ Arm said.

‘Is this happening?’ Fannigan said as he stepped out of his pants. ‘Oh Christ, I’m naked,’ he muttered, ‘I’m in the fucking nip.’

Fannigan began to fold his trousers, lining up the legs, then halving and halving them again, until it was a neat, bundled parcel of denim. This small civilised feat accomplished, he began to shake his head.

‘No, No, No. This joke’s over. I’m not putting up with this. Fuck this!’ Fannigan motioned to move past Arm but it was a cursory effort. Arm rested the heel of his hand on Fannigan’s collarbone.

‘Nearly, it’s over,’ Arm assured him.

‘Christ, can I have a smoke then?’

‘In a minute,’ Arm said.

‘There’s no time!’ Fannigan said. He had the blinky, nervous energy of a dreamer jilted suddenly awake. Fannigan looked urgently left and right, then up into the sky, at the scratchy stars and that cute old sphinx-faced cunt of a moon, up there watching and still keeping schtum after all these years. He let out another growl, a scouring phlegm-clearer, boggy and granulated and liquidly rich. He hocked and spat at Arm’s feet.

‘What time is it?’ he said.

‘Must be three,’ Arm said.