Angel couldn’t believe the mess. The whole place was upside-down. Chairs overturned. The TV smashed. Tables broken. Pictures and posters ripped off the walls, shredded. Someone had come in here to create chaos, and they’d succeeded. There was a man with a small paintbrush just inside the door, dusting greyish powder over the frame. He nodded to Farmer.

‘Nothing much yet. We’ll need to take the prints of the people who live here, to eliminate them from the rest,’ he said.

‘Sure, tell us when you’re ready.’

Paddy was righting a circular table, setting three unbroken chairs up around it. Lil went off into the kitchenette and put the kettle on. Farmer took Angel’s arm and got her seated. To his eyes, she looked white enough to pass right out.

‘Maybe you need to lie down,’ he said, concerned.

‘I’m fine. Really,’ she said faintly, running a shaking hand through her hair. Her eyes were moving around the flat in disbelief – Tom’s flat that he’d kept so nice, so neat and tidy, and now it was wrecked.

‘It’s cosmetic, most of it,’ said Farmer. ‘No real harm done.’

‘I don’t think I’ll ever feel safe here again,’ said Angel.

The print man was hovering. ‘If I can . . . ?’ he asked, and when Farmer nodded he put his gear on the table and with gentle efficiency took Angel’s prints.

‘Does anyone else live here?’ he asked.

‘My cousin Tom. But he’s in hospital right now.’ Angel was shuddering. Tom hurt. The flat a tip. And now she’d been fingerprinted, like a criminal.

But that’s what I am, she thought. I’m a murderer.

‘Maybe it would be better if we spoke later. Down the station,’ said Farmer. He glanced at Lil, who was setting out cups, pouring water, then she was talking on the phone. She came out from the kitchenette with a tray of drinks, milk, sugar and biscuits, and placed everything on the table.

‘I’ve phoned June,’ she told Angel. ‘She’s coming over and together we’ll tidy all this away, don’t worry.’

The print man then took Lil’s dabs too. ‘For elimination,’ he said.

‘Do you think there’s anything missing? Was this a robbery, interrupted?’ Paddy asked Angel.

She gave a wild glance around at the chaos. ‘I don’t know. How could I know that?’

‘There’s the matter of the front door . . .’ Lil looked at Farmer.

‘We’ll contact a carpenter to come out and sort that,’ he said.

‘Fine.’ Lil’s eyes turned to Angel. ‘But for tonight, you’ll be better off at our place.’ She placed a key in Angel’s hand. ‘You know the address.’

Angel did. She’d never been to the O’Brien family home, but she knew it all right. She knew that after Lil was widowed, she’d moved back into the old family home to live with her sister, June. No room at the inn for Dora, though. Of course not. Angel felt a flare of that old resentment, just thinking about it.