I went to the back of the bar and entered the smoking area that connected Mayne’s with the Crane Lane, a permanently packed seven-night-a-week late bar, live music club and pick-up joint. Sadie says that there should be a motorway sign in the lane outside: ‘Wrong way, turn back’. But around midnight, if you’re still out on the town, the place has an irresistible draw.

Standing, back to the wall, I waited. Seconds later, the door swung open and a man burst through. He must have seen me, but he strode quickly past and on to the lane without looking in my direction. I only got a side view, but I recognised him instantly: the man I had collided with the previous evening in Dublin, the Herald-reading rude man, though now he was wearing a black leather jacket instead of a suit. It struck me then that he seemed vaguely familiar, and not just from the coffee shop.

I doubled back through Mayne’s and crossed Pembroke Street to the GPO, hoping I’d make it before the man had a chance to follow. I went straight to the parcels section, and registered the letter to Setanta Forensic. I had intended to drive but, after what I’d heard about Rhona, registered post seemed safer. Gill was powerful, but even he couldn’t have his tentacles in An Post, surely?

From the GPO, I crossed Oliver Plunkett Street and went into Penneys, via the back door. The shop was heaving, as usual. Good luck to anyone trying to follow me through that. I dashed out the front door, on to Patrick Street and hailed a cab to take me the short trip to Coughlan’s Quay Garda Station to meet Sadie O’Riordan.

By the time I got there, I had remembered where I’d seen the man before.

27

‘Don’t worry,’ Sadie said. ‘We won’t be disturbed here, not between shift changes.’

I cradled the cup of machine soup she had given me and tried to breathe. We were in the briefing room, off the station reception area, though reception wasn’t the right word. It wasn’t a waiting room, either. Coughlan’s Quay was Cork’s detective HQ. No traffic cops. No overnight drunk and disorderlies. But if you’d done something bad, you’d probably end up here. And you’d probably be coming in the back gate.

‘So this is what I know,’ Sadie said. ‘Rhona left her house …’

‘At Park View Mews.’

‘Yeah, that’s right. At approximately ten past eight this morning intending to walk to work.’

‘On Infirmary Road.’