‘Nothing. Suffer and learn.’

‘The motto of this class,’ one of the fellas at the back muttered good-naturedly, loud enough for Tony to hear.

Shauna’s arm shot up again, but this time she did not wait for permission to speak. ‘It’s why his wife is able to convince him,’ she said quickly, as if worried she might forget her point if she was too slow.

‘What is?’

‘Weakness. She’s able to convince him what to do, because he’s weak inside and she tells him she’s stronger than he is. So he does cruel things, like killing Duncan, to try to prove to her that he’s not.’

Tony nodded approvingly. ‘That’s pretty much it.’

‘Class genius, me,’ Shauna beamed.

He remembered her comment, her pride in understanding what motivated cruelty when he saw her again, six months after she’d finished school. He’d gone to Liverpool Betty’s, a bar not far from his flat, to meet Hugh Duggan. Duggan had contacted him at school and invited him for a drink. Tony had suggested the place. Liverpool Betty herself was in her thirties, dark hair styled to one side, her fringe shadowing her eyes, her head declined slightly so that she looked up at you through her bangs as she spoke. But she ran the bar with an iron grip, her broad Liverpudlian accent cutting through the Celtic lilt of the vast bulk of her clientele.

‘Two Jameson’s, Betty,’ Duggan called. ‘And two stouts.’

He was significantly more affable than the previous time they had met, a few months earlier, at the party.

‘They’ve set up a thing in Derry,’ he said, ‘for your Danny. For people who want to do something about it.’

Tony knew enough to understand what this ‘thing’ was, and what it signified. ‘Danny wasn’t involved,’ he said.

‘He died at the hands of the enemy,’ Duggan said. ‘The bastard that did it claimed traumatic stress and got out on disability, apparently.’

Tony stared at him, considering how Duggan knew this, considering too whether his father knew and, if so, why he hadn’t shared this information with him.

‘Fucker,’ Tony said.

Duggan nodded. ‘Lots of your neighbours and that wanted to honour Danny’s memory. It’s already done.’

‘Does my dad know?’

Duggan shrugged, his gaze flitting towards Betty where she appeared at the bar with their drinks. ‘Two stout and chasers, gents,’ she said, her hands on her hips, waiting for payment.

Duggan pulled out a twenty from his wallet. ‘And one for yourself, Betty,’ he said. He waited until she’d moved to the till, out of earshot, and continued. ‘You don’t have to join. I just thought you should know, that you’d want to know.’

Tony nodded, sipping his pint. ‘Fair enough. Thanks for telling me.’

‘You’ll have a free pass because you’re family,’ Duggan continued. ‘You’d not have to sign up to anything if you didn’t want to. Sean Mullan wanted me to let you know that.’

‘And what do I have to do?’ Tony said, wiping the moustache of malty foam off his upper lip with the back of his hand, then taking a sip of his whiskey. ‘If I did want to do something?’