Meanwhile, a source close to the investigation has told The Chronicle that a number of people have received floral arrangements with sinister notes attached, which police believe may be some sort of calling card from the murderer.

‘There is no doubt in my mind that more people may be at risk and that whoever is behind this killing is an extremely organised and sick individual. Police are worried and have been trying to stop this information from getting out, fearing it could provoke panic. But people need to know how serious this is,’ the source said.

Mrs O’Loughlin spoke of the ‘horrific’ scene she came across as she was walking her dog in the early hours of last Wednesday: ‘We were walking early in the morning as we usually do, when my dog, Izzy, ran to the side of the road and started yelping. I could see the colour of her jumper first. I did what I could to help her [Ms Taylor], but she was too far gone.

‘I called an ambulance and was trying to reassure her that help was on the way, but she was so badly injured. I tried to keep her warm and was holding her hand when she muttered those words to me.

‘She was gone the next minute. I haven’t been able to get her out of my mind since.’

Mrs O’Loughlin, who worked as a theatre nurse at Altnagelvin Area Hospital during the height of the Troubles, said Ms Taylor’s injuries were ‘as horrific as anything she’d seen before’.

‘I’ve seen a lot, especially working in theatre during the Seventies and Eighties, but this was something else. I don’t know how that poor girl survived for any time at all. Whoever did this is nothing short of evil.

‘I don’t understand why the police have kept her final words a secret. People should know they’re in danger. The look on that poor girl’s face. It’ll live with me until the day I die.’

In a cruel twist of fate, sixty-seven-year-old Mrs O’Loughlin didn’t realise as she sat with Ms Taylor that the fatally injured woman had been a class mate of her own daughter, Laura O’Neill, who died unexpectedly in tragic circumstances two years ago.

Laura left behind two young children and a husband.

‘I didn’t make the connection,’ Mrs O’Loughlin said. ‘But it would appear they were in the same year group in St Catherine’s College in the late Eighties and early Nineties. The thought of two women, still so young, losing their lives is awful. I know how Clare’s parents will be feeling right now and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

‘A mother can never get over the loss of a child — and to lose a child in such a violent way is just horrendous.