‘I’ll be very, very brief, judge. Thank you for the time. I want the people of Ireland to know that I love them and I love this great country still, even after what has happened today. The establishment has never liked me, and they’ve tried to bring me down before. They didn’t succeed then, and they won’t succeed now. I put my faith in the constitution and in the jury of my fellow Irishmen and women that I will be happy to have stand in judgment over me, and I want every one of them to know now that I am completely innocent of this abominable charge, this travesty of justice, as is my mother. I am the victim here, and I will fight this horrible calumny, this stain on my character until my dying breath and I …’

‘Mr Gill, you would be far better advised to save that kind of talk for your consultations with your solicitor and your counsel. I’ll rise now.’

When the judge had left the room, Gill looked in the direction of the press benches, half raised his left arm and fist in a gesture of defiance, then turned his back on them and the courtroom. The show had finished, and the journalists knew it. As one, they leapt to their feet and started to make their way outside.

Donnie went back down to the cells immediately and I saw Esther mouth the words ‘good job, son’ to Gill and he bent to kiss her before she was taken away. But after she had left, as the courtroom emptied, he seemed to turn in on himself for a moment. He held on to the railing, his skin dull with fatigue. I remembered how he had been on that morning in my kitchen, and how frightened of him I had been then.

No longer. I saw him now for what he was, and I saw what he would become. It was over for him – his power, his riches, his great success, all of it. He would never admit his guilt, and it didn’t matter. He would fully contest the case against him, and he would fail.

The attending Garda touched Gill’s elbow, but he made no move towards the stairs. I stood to go, and he must have heard something because he glanced up at the public gallery, empty except for me. He hadn’t known I was there, I think, and when he saw me his eyes widened, very slightly.