One U2 T-shirt, probably worth hundreds, if it hadn’t been pockmarked with rot. One blue-and-white-striped T-shirt. One man’s black waistcoat; the Annie Hall look was in then. One purple woolen pullover. One pale-blue plastic rosary. Two white cotton bras. One off-brand Walkman that I spent months saving for; I got the last two quid a week before her eighteenth birthday, by helping Beaker Murray sell bootleg videos down at the Iveagh Market. One spray can of Sure deodorant. A dozen home-taped cassettes, and I could still read her round handwriting on some of the inserts: REM, Murmur; U2, Boy; Thin Lizzy, the Boomtown Rats, the Stranglers, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Rosie could leave everything else behind, but her record collection was coming with her.

At the bottom of the case was a brown envelope. The bits of paper inside had been mashed into a solid lump by twenty-two years’ worth of damp; when I pulled delicately at the edge, it came apart like a wet jacks roll. One more favor for the Bureau. A few blurred words of type still showed through the plastic window in the front of the envelope.

. . . LAOGHAIRE-HOLYHEAD . . . DEPARTING . . . :30AM . . . Wherever Rosie had gone, she had got there without our ferry tickets.

Everyone was staring at me. Kevin looked genuinely upset. “Well,” I said. “That appears to be Rosie Daly’s suitcase, all right.” I started to transfer stuff from the lid back into the case, leaving the papers till last so they wouldn’t get crushed.

“Will we call the Guards?” Carmel asked. Da cleared his throat, spectacularly, like he was going to spit; Ma shot him a ferocious look.

I asked, “And say what?”

Clearly no one had thought about this. “Someone stuck a suitcase behind a fireplace, twenty-odd years ago,” I said. “It’s hardly the crime of the century. The Dalys can ring the Guards if they want, but I’m warning you now, I wouldn’t expect them to bring out the big guns for the Case of the Blocked Chimney.”

“But Rosie, sure,” Jackie said. She was tugging at a piece of hair and gazing at me, all bunny-teeth and big worried blue eyes. “She’s missing. And that yoke there, that’s a clue, or evidence, or whatever you call it. Should we not . . . ?”

“Was she reported missing?”

Glances back and forth: nobody knew. I seriously doubted it. In the Liberties, cops are like the jellyfish in Pacman: they’re part of the game, you get good at avoiding them, and you definitely don’t go looking for them. “If she wasn’t,” I said, shutting the case with my fingertips, “it’s a little late now.”

“But,” Jackie said. “Hang on. Does this not look like . . . ? You know. Like she didn’t go off to England after all. Does it not seem like maybe someone might have . . . ?”